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THE TEMPERANCE 

BIBLE-COMMENTARY. 

FIRST AMERICAN EDITION, 

WITH A NEW PREFACE 

BY TAYLER LEWIS, LLD, 

PROFESSOR OF ORIENTAL LITERATURE, UNION COLLEGE, SCHENECTADY. 



" It is unique in its kind as a collection and fair presentation of everything in 
Scripture that can possibly bear on the question. It sets before us the whole matter 
— Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Chaldee. 

' ' Regarded simply as a Biblical treatise, having no reference to a much dis- 
puted moral question, it would be pronounced by scholars a work of high philo- 
logical value." — Professor Tayler Lewis, Union College. 

" The more I look into this noble work, the more do I admire its breadth, depth, 
and exhaustiveness. It is a truly grand contribution." — Professor Guthrie, 
Glasgow. 

"This work is exhaustive of the subject, and will have a permanent value. It 
is no inconsiderable service to have rescued the Bible from the false glosses of 
prejudice and ignorance." — The Northern Express, Newcastle-on-Tyne. 

"No less than 638 passages of Holy Scripture are explained in the goodly vol- 
ume." — The Methodist Recorder. 

" We commend all parties to read this book, and involving as it does the question 
of the frown or approbation of Holy Scripture on our social drinking usages, it 
cannot be too gravely read or too devoutly pondered." — The Baptist Messenger, 
England. 

" I have now kept it on my table for several months. I found it of great use in 
interpreting certain passages in the Lessons, and other portions of Holy Scripture, 
which I had occasion to read privately and before my congregation. On the points 
it more especially examines, it is more thorough and exhaustive than any com- 
mentary I have ever met with. I don't wonder that our learned friend, Dr Tayler 
Lewis, speaks of it so warmly, as a valuable addition to our sacred literature.'''' — 
W. Payne, D. D., Schenectady. 

"The Book of Books on this question. I trust steps will be taken by some 
friend of truth and humanity in each church in this Union, to supply his own 
pastor with a copy." — Hon. E. C. DELAVAN, Schenectady. 



THE TEMPERANCE 



BIBLE-COMMENTARY: 



GIVING AT ONE VIEW 

VERSION, CRITICISM, AND EXPOSITION, 

IN REGARD TO 

ALL PASSAGES OF HOLY WRIT BEARING ON < WINE ' AND 

< STRONG DRINK,' OR ILLUSTRATING THE PRINCIPLES 

OF THE TEMPERANCE REFORMATION. 



BY 

Dr FREDERIC RICHARD LEES, F.S.A. 

u 

AND 

Rev. DAWSON BURNS, M.A. 



Rightly dividing the Word of Truth." 



NEW YORK: 

Sheldon & Co., 500 Broadway. 

National Temperance Society and Publication House, 

J. N. Stearns, i 72 William Street. 

1870. 



^ 



\ 



4* 



tf-o 



Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by 

WEED, PARSONS & CO., 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Northern District of New York. 



JAW** 194 



WEED. PARSON'S AND COMPANY, 

PRINTERS AND STEREOTYPERS, 

ALBANY, NEW YORK. 



o 



f}. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

I. — General Prefaces : - ix 

I. By the Authors ix 

II. By Professor Tayler Lewis xi 

Preface to the Notes xiv 

Explanations of marks and abbreviations, etc. .... xvi 

II. — Preliminary Dissertation xvii 

III. — Notes on the Books of the Old Testament (493 Passages), 

COMPRISING — 

The Book of Genesis 17 No of Passages 3 

The Book of Exodus .... 16 " 26 

The Book of Leviticus 20 " 34 

The Book of Numbers .... 21 " 41 

The Book of Deuteronomy .... 35 " 51 

The Book of Joshua 5 " 66 

The Book of Judges 14 " 68 

The Book of Ruth 2 " 77 

The First Book of Samuel 11 " 79 

The Second Book of Samuel ... 5 " 85 

The First Book of Kings .... 8 " 88 

The Second Book of Kings ... n " 91 

The First Book of Chronicles ... 6 " 96 

The Second Book of Chronicles - 11 " 98 

The Book of Ezra .--.-- 6 " 101 

The Book of Nehemiah .... 15 " 103 

The Book of Esther 11 " 108 

The Book of Job ..... 10 " 113 

The Book of Psalms 26 " 117 

The Book of Proverbs .... 26 " 129 

The Book of Ecclesiastes .... 7 " 147 

The Book of Canticles (or Song of Solomon) 18 " 150 

The Book of the Prophet Isaiah ... 65 " 156 

The Book of the Prophet Jeremiah - 32 " 184 

The Book of the Lamentations of Jeremiah - 5 " 202 

The Book of the Prophet Ezekiel - - 13 " 205 

The Book of the Prophet Daniel ... 6 " 211 

The Book of the Prophet Hosea - - 17 " 217 

The Book of the Prophet Joel - - 14 " 225 

The Book of the Prophet Amos - - - 10 " 229 

The Book of the Prophet Obadiah I " 233 

The Book of the Prophet Jonah - 1 " 234 



VI TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



The Book of the Prophet Micah - - - 5 No of Passages 235 

The Book of the Prophet Nahum - 2 " 238 

The Book of the Prophet Habakkuk - 4 " 239 

The Book of the Prophet Zephaniah - 2 " 242 

The Book of the Prophet Haggai ... 5 " 243 

The Book of the Prophet Zechariah - 7 " 245 

The Book of the Prophet Malachi I " 248 

Additional Notes on the Old Testament: 

The Book of Genesis, 1 Supplemental Note .... 249 
The Book of Exodus, I Supplemental Note, I New 

Note ..- 1 Passage 249 

The Book of Numbers, I New Note - - 1 " 250 

The Book of Deuteronomy, I Supplemental Note, ... 250 

The Book of Esther, 1 Supplemental Note .... 250 

The Book of Proverbs, I Supplemental Note' - - - 25 1 

The Book of Canticles, I Supplemental Note - - - - 251 

IV. — Connection of the Old and New Testaments .... 252 

V — Notes on the Books of the New Testament (144 Passages), 
Comprising — 
The Gospel according to St Matthew 21 No of Passages 261 

The Gospel according to St Mark - - 6 " 289 

The Gospel according to St Luke - - - 16 " 292 

The Gospel according to St John - 8 " 301 

The Acts of the Apostles .... 9 " 312 

The Epistle of St Paul to the Romans - 12 " 320 

The First Epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians 19 " 328 

The Second Epistle of St Paul to the Corinthians 2 " 346 

The Epistle of St Paul to the Galatians 6 " 348 

The Epistle of St Paul to the Ephesians - I " 352 

The Epistle of St Paul to the Philippians - 2 " 355 

The Epistle of St Paul to the Colossians - 3 " 357 

The First Epistle of St Paul to the Thessalonians 3 " 360 

The First Epistle of St Paul to Timothy 7 " 367 

The Epistle of St Paul to Titus ... 4 « 377 

The Epistle of St Paul to Philemon - I " 379 

The General Epistle to the Hebrews - I " 380 

The General Epistle of St James - 3 " 381 

The First General Epistle of St Peter - 6 " 383 

The Second General Epistle of St Peter I " 388 

The Book of the Revelation of St John - 13 " 389 

VI. — Appendix A: A Selection of Scripture Texts, Exhibiting 
the Authorized English Version with Suggested 
Emendations. 

1. The Old Testament 397 

2. The New Testament 408 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. Vll 

PAGH 

VII. — Appendix B, containing Classified and Translated Lists 
of Hebrew and Greek Words in the Old and New 
Testaments. 

Old Testament: 

1. Hebrew Words translated Wine and Strong Drink - 412 

2. Hebrew Words translated Vineyard, Vine, etc. - - 419 

3. Hebrew Words translated Leaven, Vinegar, Unfermented 

Bread, etc. 421 

4. Hebrew Words translated Drunken, Drunkenness and 

Drunkard 422 

5. Hebrew Words descriptive of the Nature and Effects of 

Intoxicating Drink 422 

6. Other Hebrew Words explained in the Notes - - 423 

New Testament : 

1. Greek Words translated Wine, Strong Drink and Vinegar 425 

2. Greek Words translated Vine, Vineyard, Fruit of the 

Vine, Grapes, Clusters - 426 

3. Greek Words translated Leaven, Unleavened Bread, 

Drunkenness, Drunkard, Drunk, Temperance, Sober - 427 

4. Other New Testament Greek Words explained in the 

Notes 428 

VIII. — Appendix C: The Application of 'Yayin' and 'Oinos' to 

the Unfermented Juice of the Grape - 431 

IX. — Appendix D : Wines, Ancient and Modern. 

1. Original Authorities on Ancient Wines ... 434 

2. Produce of Vineyards in the East 441 

3. Notice of Fallacies in the Bibliotheca Sacra - - 446 

X. — Index -.-.. 447 



GENERAL PREFACES. 



i. 

Christians everywhere unite in accepting the saying of St Paul that 
all God-inspired Scripture is " profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for cor- 
rection, for instruction in righteousness; that the man of God may be 
perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works'* (2 Tim. iii. 16, 17). 
But the profit derived from Divine Truth will necessarily vary according 
to the degree of teachableness and soundness of judgment brought to its 
perusal. The Bible is not accountable for the multifarious errors and 
abuses it has been employed to support ; yet it is occasion for lamentation 
that on not a few great questions, both of Science and Morals, the Living 
Oracles have been strangely misapprehended and misapplied. Not the 
illiterate and vicious alone, but successive generations of scholars and 
divines, have enunciated mischievous fallacies professedly extracted from 
the Scriptures. In Physical Science, the fixity and recent creation of the 
earth ; in Political Philosophy, the right of arbitrary government and 
Negro slavery ; in Social Economy, the excellence of Polygamy ; in 
Ecclesiastical ethics, the duty of persecuting heretics, and the obligation 
of unlimited submission to the clergy : these and other baneful dogmas 
have been zealously propounded, not as speculative theories, but as the 
practical teachings of the Divine Word. That such conclusions are now 
commonly discarded is not due to any change in the Record,, but to a 
marked improvement in the manner of reading it ; and to a perception 
that there can be no real contradiction between one portion of Holy Scrip- 
ture and another, or between the Revelation of God in Nature and in Wis 
Written Will. 

Not less obviously true is it, that social customs and personal habits of 
diet and indulgence, continued from childhood upwards, may induce a 
state of mind inconsistent with the unbiased interpretation of Holy Writ. 
For example, let a man be accustomed to regard intoxicating liquor as a 
necessity, or even a valuable auxiliary, of life, and as an innocent vehicle 
of enjoyment and social entertainment ; let him remain ignorant of all 
that can be said and has been proved to the contrary ; let him consider the 
intemperance arising from strong drink to be one of the inevitable forms 
of natural depravity, and therefore to be classed in its origin as well as its 
results with other sins of the flesh ; let him persuade himself that the ordi- 
nary means of Christian evangelization are sufficient to eradicate this pro- 
lific vice with its dismal progeny of social curses: let all this be done, and 
it will no longer appear surprising that many of the allusions contained in 
both the Old and New Testaments are construed in favor of the use of 
such drink, and that other passages, clearly opposite in their tendency, 
should be ignored or explained away. This may be done in perfect good 
faith, and without any consciousness of the process by which the one-sided 
exegesis is wrought out. 

Accordingly, when the Temperance Reformation began, some of the 

earliest arguments brought against it were borrowed (as was supposed) 

from the armory of Scripture texts; and down to the present time many 

who hold aloof from that cause, defend their estrangement by a similar 

b 



AUTHORS' preface. 



appeal to Scripture precedent and approval. Some even go the length of 
charging abstainers with a conduct at variance not only with the privileges, 
but with the duties of the Christian dispensation, and accuse them of seek- 
ing to impose a code of asceticism contrary to the genial and liberal spirit 
of the Gospel. In controverting what have been represented as the views 
of Temperance writers upon the wines named in Scripture, some critics 
have ignorantly attributed to them the most absurd positions — such as 
that all those wines were unfermented and uninebriating — while they 
themselves have neglected to distinguish between the various terms trans- 
lated 'wine,' and have confounded the use of intoxicating liquor by men 
of old, and the permission of such use, with the express sanction and 
blessing of God. 

To some friends of the Temperance movement a work of this character 
may appear superfluous. Certain of them may be disposed to deny that 
the question is one for Bible arbitration or reference at all ; while others 
may be prepared to concede that Scripture permits and approves the use 
of strong drink, though also permitting and approving of abstinence from 
it. It is in vain, however, to expect that the Bible will cease to be quoted 
as an authority on the subject of Temperance ; nor is it desirable that its 
store of facts should be overlooked, or its testimony left unexamined and 
disregarded. Those who contend that ' liberty to abstain ' is all that is 
needed as an argumentative basis for abstinence, will find themselves un- 
deceived when they attempt to urge the practice upon others as a duty ; 
for how can that be a duty, it will be asked, the opposite of which is sanc- 
tioned by both the letter and the spirit of the Divine Word ? Besides, 
even the argument from Christian expediency, to which such friends attach 
a high (if not exclusive) importance, cannot be understood without an 
appeal to passages of Scripture whose true meaning and legitimate bearing 
have been warmly contested. 

In reply to the inquiry, which may not be discourteously proposed, 
whether the authors of this Commentary can claim to be exempt from a 
bias in favor of abstinence which may have inspired and controlled their 
exposition? — they can but say that they have been fully sensible of their 
liability to such an influence, and have therefore endeavored to counteract 
its operation by carefully weighing all adverse arguments, and by placing 
before the reader the materials by which he may form for himself an inde- 
pendent judgment as to the correctness of the inferences drawn. They 
have honestly sought, with trust in Divine aid, to discover the truth con- 
tained in the passages successively discussed ; and, in consigning the fruit 
of their labors to the press, they pray that the blessing of Heaven may 
attend it so far as it is adapted to promote the faithful, intelligent study 
of Scripture, and a more perfect sympathy with the spirit of the Psalmist, 
"Teach me, O Lord, the way of Thy statutes ; and I shall keep it unto 
the end. Give me understanding, and I shall keep Thy law; yea, I shall 
observe it with my whole heart. ' ' 

The Authors. 



AMERICAN SUPPLEMENTARY PREFACE. XI 



II. 

I have given to the book entitled The Temperance Bible Commen* 
tary as close an examination as my poor health will allow. The result 
has been a high opinion of its value. The preliminary dissertation is 
able, clear, comprehensive ; above all, exhibiting that sound common 
sense which, in the interpretation of the Scriptures, would avoid the 
perversions of pedantry on the one hand, and all forced attempts to 
make out a rigid conformity to modern science on the other. This is 
very happily illustrated by the remark that " the Bible is not a book 
of science, dictated in technical and scholastic language, but a book 
of life, written in the language of daily life, of national history, of popu- 
lar apologue." There has been committed on this topic (as is well 
shown in the ' Introduction ') the same error of interpretation that so 
long perverted and confused the Slavery question. It was the error 
of applying ancient words, and ancient ideas expressed by them, to 
modern things, modern relations, and modern practices, which, though 
covered by the same general language, had undergone a change so 
great, as to amount to almost a radical difference. What a wide dis- 
tance, for example, between the Abrahamic relation of chieftain and 
follower, or the domestic service of the simple Jewish agricultural life, 
to which the commercial ideas of sale and traffic were almost wholly 
unknown, and the vile, mercenary, man-degrading slavery of a Bra- 
zilian cotton and sugar plantation! The anti-temperance writers err 
in the same way when they apply the artless language of Scripture 
(as used of the comparatively harmless substances they often repre- 
sent) to the vile and noxious compounds which, in modern times, pass 
under similar names. The ordinary wine of Palestine, even if it did 
contain a little alcohol, unknown to any science of the day — a ques- 
tion which is hardly worth discussing — what a vast difference between 
this and the fiery potations now manufactured for our hotels, our 
drinking saloons, and alas! too often, it must be said, for our holy, 
Christian communion tables. And yet these modern compounds are 
also called 'wine,' and those who use them would shelter themselves 
under the old appellations which, in the days of Noah and David, 
were given to such widely different things. Anti-temperance critics 
are fond of charging the zealous temperance advocate with perver- 
sions of Scripture and strained interpretations. This is doubtless true 
in some cases, but the fault is far more apt to be on the other side. 
The whole scope and spirit of a precept is often overlooked by the 



Xll AMERICAN PREFACE. 

wine advocate, and some mere contrast or illustration (belonging, not 
to the inspired heart of the passage, but to the necessarily imperfect 
human language in which it is conveyed, and to the imperfect human 
knowledge which is an inseparable accompaniment of such language) 
is elevated into all the dignity and authority of & precept , commanding 
us directly to drink wine, as though it were good per se — a duty, in 
fact, the neglect of which would be a slighting of the Divine benefi- 
cence. The much-talked-of sin per se of the other side, however 
strained and harsh it may sometimes appear, is far more sound and 
rational. Thus, for example, Proverbs xxxi: 6-7, is taken by some as 
not only a perfect justification of wine-drinking as a common practice, 
but even as a command to do so in certain cases. When we look, 
however, at the whole passage, and study its spirit, we find it to be 
one of the strongest abstinence texts in the whole Bible. " Not for 
kings, not for kings" — it is twice repeated — "not for princes," not for 
rulers, not for men who have charge of high interests, not for men in 
health (as is the fair implication) who have responsible duties to per- 
form — it is not for these, not at all for these, to drink wine. They 
are not to touch it. This is the only meaning of language so repeated, 
so intense, so emphatic. 

The Bible writers may err in their manner of conceiving, and in 
their mode of stating physical facts (as, for example, in the statement 
that "the moon" may "smite by night"). Their true inspiration 
belongs to a higher plane. In the knowledge, however, of spiritual 
conditions, whether good or evil, our modern science gives us no 
advantage over them. There is one evil state of soul condemned 
throughout the Bible. It is that state to which we give the name 
intoxication, or inebriation, but which, having no term corresponding 
to it in the Hebrew, is described and most vividly set before us (see 
Prov. xxiii : 29, 35) in its phenomena and effects. It was, on the part 
of the Bible writers, simply the observation of a spiritual fact, requir- 
ing no chemical analysis, or any scientific knowledge in respect to the 
working or degree of alcohol. As a spiritual fact, it was as well 
known to Jeremiah, Hosea, and the author of the book of Proverbs, 
as it is to Faraday, Liebig, and Draper. It is the act of a person in 
health, voluntarily, and without any other motive or reason than the 
pleasurable stimulus, using any substance whatever, be it solid or liquid, 
to produce an unnatural change in his healthy mental and bodily state, 
either by way of exciting or quieting the nerves and brain, or quick- 
ening the pulse. This was wrong — a spiritual wrong — a sin per se — 



AMERICAN PREFACE. Xlil 

not a matter of excess merely, but wrong and evil in any, even the 
smallest, measure or degree. Although there might be much igno- 
rance in respect to its real internal causation, the outward substances 
known to produce this effect — above all, which were used for the 
very purpose of producing it (for here was the spiritual crime) — are 
denounced as something which men are not to touch — not even " to 
look at." The description may be scientifically correct or erroneous ; 
it may also be difficult to determine, precisely, what is meant by cer- 
tain Hebrew phrases in this remarkable passage; but the general 
sense, as well as the precise point intended, is unmistakably clear. It 
is intoxicating drink that is meant — intoxicating in any degree — 
drink sought for that very purpose of producing such unnatural change 
in the healthy hu?nan system. There was to be no moderate drinking 
(or desire) here. However gentle, exhilarating, convivial, or pleas- 
antly soothing might be its first effects, at the last "it biteth like a 
serpent, and stingeth like an adder." 

Such is the doctrine taught in the artless Scripture language, and 
sometimes in passages quoted as in their favor. Nothing could be 
better calculated to impress this great spiritual lesson than the array of 
scriptural texts in the book before us. There may be dissent, just 
dissent perhaps, from some of the writers' exegetical reasoning. This, 
however, affects but little the great and real merit of the work. It is 
unique in its kind, as a collection, and fair presentation, of everything 
in Scripture that can possibly bear on either aspect of the temperance 
question. We have it all here. // sets before us the whole matter. 
There is given every passage from our common version. Added to 
this, there is a faithful presentation of the Hebrew in Roman letters. We 
have also copious and satisfactory citations from the ancient versions 
— Greek, Latin, Syriac, and Chaldaic — together with a great deal of 
most valuable ancient and modern commentary. It may be safely 
said that, aside from its bearing on the temperance question, the book 
is a very important contribution to Biblical knowledge in general. 
Had it been the work of some German author, intended simply as 
a Biblical aid to the understanding of an important department of 
Hebrew words and Hebrew usages, it would have been well received 
as a valuable addition to our sacred literature. 

Tayler Lewis, LL. D. 

Union College, Schenectady, 1869. 



PREFACE TO THE NOTES. 



In order to accurate Biblical exposition two conditions are indispensable — a correct 
state of the Text, and a correct analysis of its terms. There will then remain 
to be secured a proper apprehension of each passage in its entireness, in its 
relation to the context, and in its application to the whole body of revealed Truth 
and Duty. 
I. The State of the Original Text is chiefly to be gathered, — 

1. As to the Old Testament, from a comparison of the Received Hebrew Text 

with, — 
(i) The Hebrew Samaritan Text and the Samaritan Version, which are limited 
to the Pentateuch. 

(2) The Greek Versions, especially the Septuagint Version (executed in parts 

between 270 and 170 B.C.),* as it exists in the Alexandrine and Vatican 
Codices (marked A and B), with the Aldine and Complutensian 
editions and the variations preserved in Origen's Hexapla; also the 
Versions of Aquila (about 120 a.d.), Theodotion (executed about 130 
A.D.), and Symmachus (about 200 A.D. ), all of which have come down 
to us in a fragmentary form. 

(3) The Latin Vulgate, which consists of St Jerome's translation (390 A.D.) 

except the Book of Psalms, which is in the old Italic Version. The 
Vulgate is the Authorized Version of the Roman Catholic Church. 

(4) The Targums (z. e. Interpretations) of Onkelos, Jonathan, Pseudo- 

Jonathan, Jerusalem, etc. These Targums were executed subsequently 
to the Christian era, except perhaps that of Onkelos, who is supposed 
to have lived B.C. 50. They are written in the Aramaean or Western 
dialect of the Chaldee. 

(5) The Syriac, Ethiopic, and Arabic Versions. 

2. As to the New Testament, the Original Text is to be gathered from a 

comparison of the Received Greek Text, as fixed by Stephens (1550), 
with, — 

(1) The Alexandrine Codex, executed in the fourth or fifth century, which 

wants Matthew i. — xxv. 5 ; John vi. 50 — viii. 52 ; 2 Corinthians iv. 3 — 
xii. 7. 

(2) The Vatican Codex No. 1209, of about the same date, which wants 

Hebrews from ix. 14, the Epistles to Timothy, Titus, and Philemon, 
and the Apocalypse. 

* This title, signifying ' the Version of the Seventy,' arose from an ancient but untenable tradition, 
that seventy learned men were simultaneously engaged at Alexandria in the production of this par- 
ticular translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek. 



PREFACE TO THE NOTES. XV 

(3) The Ephraem Codex, of about equal antiquity, which contains fragments 

of all the books of the New Testament. 

(4) The Sinaitic Codex, which rivals or excels the foregoing in age. 

(5) The Beza or Cambridge Codex, referred to the fifth century, with the 

exception of some occasional pages by a much later hand. This Codex, 
which is partly in Greek and in Latin (the old Italic prior to St 
Jerome), contains most of the Gospels and the Acts. 

(6) The Claremont Codex, of the sixth or seventh century, furnishing St 

Paul's Epistles, with the Hebrews by a later copyist. 

(7) The Dublin Codex, of the sixth century, which gives St Matthew's 

Gospel. 

(8) The Basilian Codex No. 105 (otherwise known as the Vatican Codex 

No. 2066), which is referred to the eighth century, and contains the 
Apocalypse. 

(9) The Latin Vulgate, Syriac, and other early Versions. 

II. An Analysis of the original terms employed by the Sacred Writers can only 

be successfully prosecuted by a reference to the equivalent terms found in the 
Versions, and the sense in which they are used by other writers. For example 
Josephus and Philo — who, though Jews, wrote in Greek — put us in posses- 
sion of the meaning attached in their day — the first century of the Christian 
era — to various Hebrew and Greek phrases that occur in the Sacred writings. 
The assistance afforded by Lexicons is in proportion to their apt citation 
from original authors, and the ability shown in tracing obscure words to 
their probable roots, or in bringing comparative philology to illustrate their 
generic significations. Historical researches into ancient arts and usages, 
and a knowledge of existing Eastern customs, often throw light upon the 
language of the Bible. 

III. The correct Apprehension and Application of complete passages of 

Holy Writ will mainly depend, after the preliminary critical researches, upon 
candor, sound judgment, and spiritual insight. A regard to 'the analogy 
of faith,' and the cardinal principles of all just interpretation, will tend to 
preserve from erroneous views. 



The Notes of this Commentary upon each passage chiefly consist of two parts, 
— the first part dealing with all the critical questions involved, the latter with the 
literal sense and practical lessons of the passage reviewed. For the general 
reader's convenience, Hebrew, Chaldee, and Greek words are printed in English 
type. 

All important quotations from other languages are given verbatim for the satis- 
faction of scholars, but translations are always affixed that others may be enabled 
to weigh the evidence adduced. 

In the texts from the Authorized English Version the Italics are retained, and 
indicate that the words so printed were supplied by the translators to complete the 
sense. In other places italics are used to distinguish foreign words, or to draw 
special attention to the thoughts expressed. 



The Marks of Abbreviation employed in the Notes are as under : — 
Lxx. for the Greek Septuagint Version. 
A. V. for the Authorized English Version in common use. 
V. for the Latin Vulgate Version. 
T. and Ts. for Tar gum and Targums. 
Codex A for the Greek Alexandrine Codex. 
Codex B " " Vatican Codex, 1209. 
Codex C " " Ephraem Codex. 
Codex Aleph " Sinaitic Codex. 

Codex D " " Beza or Cambridge Codex. 
Codex V " " Claremont Codex. 
Codex Z " " Dublin Codex. 

Codex Bb " " Basilian Codex 105, or Vatican Codex 2066. 
Prel. Dis. for Preliminary Dissertation. 
= stands for 'equivalent to,' or 'that is.' 
- over a letter signifies that it is to be pronounced long, as 'o' in 'more.' 
u " " " short, as 'e' in 'met.' 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 



The following Commentary on certain passages of Holy Writ has 
been undertaken for the elucidation and development of important 
and practical, but long-neglected, portions of Divine truth. It is 
desirable, at starting, that readers who, like the noble Beraeans, are 
willing to search for the truth in the love of.it, should understand the 
special object of the inquiry, and the principles upon which we propose 
to conduct it. We repudiate entirely every species of * Authority,' 
properly so called. Faith, indeed, must accept the facts of Revelation, 
just as philosophy must accept the facts of Nature — using there, 
however, all reasonable care in the examination; — but, after that, no 
mortal intellect can have a monopoly of judgment, or, without 
presumption, pretend to an infallibility of interpretation. One only 
rule will hold then, — " Prove all things : holdfast to that which is " true. 

As we do not see with the eyes of other men, neither do we claim 
that other men should see with ours. But what we do assert is, that 
while the Divine objective Truth is one, not various, so the subjective 
faculty of Reason is one, working by common laws to common and 
invincible conclusions. This is the sole guarantee of truth being 
either possible or actual ; and therefore evidence is everything, and bare 
'opinion' nothing. On that evidence alone we place our reliance: 
if it is invalid our inference falls ; if otherwise, it will stand ; but no 
imaginable amount of unbelief and dogmatic denial can disturb or 
overturn it. As the acute Professor Mansel has observed, " it is of 
little importance to what authority we appeal, so long as the evidence 
itself will not bear criticism." Were a lawyer, in defending a client, 
to decline putting facts and evidence before the jury, and content 
himself with referring to a number of ' learned opinions,' both judge 
and jury would regard his defense either as imbecility calling for pity, 
or as impudence meriting contempt. But criticism ought to be 
governed by laws of evidence as strict and unbending as those which 
are observed in our law courts; and mere 'opinion' ought to be 
held quite as cheap. 

I. The first proposition to be established is one of a purely 
philological and matter-of^to character, namely, — That there is nothing 
in the nature and usage of the words for Wine, etc., in the Bible, 
which at all teaches that the use of intoxicating drink is in harmony 



xviii PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

with the Divine will. This proposition will be proved just as con- 
clusively on the hypothesis that the Bible is a book of simple history, 
as on the conception of its containing a Divine revelation. The 
following are the thirteen words of the Original Scriptures which, 
unfortunately for the English reader, have all been commingled and 
confused under the translation of the single term Wine, either with 
or without an adjective of qualification, such as ' new,' ' sweet,' ' mixed,' 
or * strong,' — namely: — in Hebrew, Yayin, Khamar, Shakar, Mesek, 
Ahsis, Soveh, Tirosh, Ashishah, Shemarim : in Greek, Oinos, Gleukos, 
Oxos, and Akraton. There are, besides, closely associated with these 
words, two others — the Hebrew adjective Khemer (foaming), and 
Khometz, translated ' vinegar.' When persons attempt to argue, from 
the Authorized Version, the merits of the wine question, no wonder 
they fall into inextricable difficulties and pernicious delusions. Mr 
De Quincey's observation, in his article on 'The Philosophy of 
Herodotus,' is exceedingly apposite : — " How often do we hear 
people commenting on the Scriptures, and raising up aerial edifices 
of argument, in which every iota of the logic rests, unconsciously to 
themselves, upon the accidental words of the English version, and 
melts away when applied to the original text! so that, in fact, the 
whole has no more strength than if it were built upon a pun or an 
Equivoque" Nor is it the unlearned alone who are apt to fall into 
this fallacy. Even so good a Hebraist as Professor Murphy, in 
referring to Prov. iii. 10 and Joel ii. 24, has distorted the meaning 
of yeqev and tirosh in order to accommodate their sense to the 
English mistranslations ' omst-out and ' overflow. 1 Long ago, 
Dr S. Lee, Hebrew Professor at Cambridge, in the preface to his 
1 Hebrew Lexicon,' pointed out this teeming source of error : — " As to 
Noldius— and the same may be said of lexicographers but too 
generally, — his practice evinces no endeavor beyond that of offering 
a signification — well suited, as he thought, to each place — which 
eventually resolves itself into a system of mere conjecture, and one, 
moreover, which takes for granted that the particular signification he 
ascribed to every other word in such passage was above all suspicion 
correct." Thus in the article ' Wine,' in Dr Smith's ' Dictionary of 
the Bible,' the writer permits the supposed association of tirosh with 
a liquid — in the famous triad, ' corn, wine, and oil ' — to influence 
his judgment as to the term translated 'wine,' when, in reality, the 
proper word for ' oil ' (shemen) does not occur there as stated ; and, 
moreover, the word translated 'oil' is clearly a //^translation, the 
proper meaning of yitzhar being ' orchard-fruit,' if etymology, induc- 
tion, and context are to have any weight in determining the meaning 
of language. It is thus under the conjoint influence of prejudice, 
carelessness, and false conjecture, that errors increase and multiply, 
and one blunder is made the buttress and bulwark of another. 

Mr John Stuart Mill, in his ' System of Logic,' has well laid down 
an important law of speech : — " Language is the depository of the 
accumulated experience to which all former ages have contributed 
their part, and which is the inheritance of all yet to come. It may 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xix 

be good to alter the meaning of a word, but it is bad to let any part 
of the meaning drop. Whoever seeks to introduce a more correct 
use of a term should be required to possess an accurate acquaintance 
with the history of the particular word. . . . To be qualified 
to define the name, we must know all that has ever been known of 
the properties of the class of objects which are, or originally were, 
denoted by it. ... A generic term is always liable to become 
limited to a single species, if people have occasion to think and speak 
of that species much oftener than of anything else contained in the 
genus. . . . The tide of custom first drifts the word on the shore 
of a particular meaning, then retires and leaves it there." 

This species of fallacy would be seen through at once if it were used 
in reference to matters not touching our appetites or interests. For 
example, who would be deceived by the allegation that as " ' Prevent'' 
now signifies to 'hinder' or 'oppose', therefore it signifies the same 
in the Collect, ' Prevent us, O Lord, in all our doings, with Thy most 
gracious favor ' " ? The answer would be, that, at the time the prayer 
was published, 'prevent' had the etymological sense of going before ; 
that a modern use has nothing necessarily to do with an ancient use 
of a word; and that the later sense arose, as explained by Mr Mill, 
from the fact that obstacles — things before us — are more frequently 
4 hindrances '. than 'helps.' Or should it be alleged that " villains 
are foul rogues: but in the Middle Ages farm-laborers and peasants 
were chiefly villains, therefore very bad men," — should we not laugh 
in the face of the verbal trickster ? In what respect, however, does 
this differ from the way in which, by the abuse of the word ' Wine,' 
the same paralogism is attempted to be palmed upon us ? Men — and 
sometimes people professing to be 'scholars' — go to a technical 
dictionary of the eighteenth or nineteenth century, quote an exclusive 
definition of wine as ' the fermented juice of the grape,' and ask us to 
jump with them to the crooked conclusion, " Therefore wine, 2,coo 
years ago, never signified anything less or anything more " ! When 
perversity has attained to this point it serves to illustrate the truth of a 
remark once made by an ' Eclectic Reviewer,' that " the understand- 
ing may be so blinded by circumstance, or by prejudice, as to meet 
with darkness in the daytime, and to grope at noonday as in night." 
It is high time that such 'fallacies of the dictionary' should be 
remitted to the nursery or the asylum. This very word, by the way, 
is another illustration; but should the day ever come when the 
conventional sense of 'house for lunatics' shall have absorbed all 
other senses, will that prove that during a series of ages it had not the 
broader sense of ' refuge ' ? 

When we speak of the various senses of such words as wine, man, 
spirit, wife, angel, let us not be misunderstood. A word of this sort 
is vaguely descriptive and broadly general. There is no single word 
of this kind with any definite sense ; the special sense is derived from 
the application, — i. e. from the context. If we say, ' In heaven there 
are Angels] and also, ' In riell there are Angels] — while the word 
'angel' is the same, the objects connoted are, in specific quality, as 



XX PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

distinct as the opposing spheres. The 'fallacy of the lexicon' is 
very common, whereby the sense of the context is imported into the 
innocent word. The figure 3 expresses a distinct relation as a 
symbol, but it may be applied to plums or potatoes; still the 
qualities of the things do not attach to the figure. So with words. 
'Wine' primarily expressed the relatio7i of 'liquid offspring to the 
vine-cluster ' ; but it does not, never did, nor, in the nature of things, 
ever can mark out the later, and for thousands of years obscure, 
relationship of 'fermentation.' The Jewish rabbins, we are dis- 
tinctly told, had a peculiar theory that ' the juices of fruits did not 
ferment] — so little did they know of the occult process that is now 
assumed to have been the origin of the name for wine ! In fact, all 
the ancients knew of the matter was, that grape-juice ' foamed ' and 
'boiled,' like the froth of the sea, boiling water, or bitumen; and 
this idea is the sole one expressed by the words yavan and khamer, 
from which verbs the Hebrew and Chaldee words for wine are 
usually derived.* 

As ' angel ' denotes the relation of ' messenger ' to some sovereign 
master, but cannot express the kind and quality of mastership or service, 
whether of devil or Deity, so the word ' wine ' expresses the relation- 
ship of ' the blood of the vine,' but cannot possibly signalize the special 
state into which it has got — whether it is pure khemer, or mustum, or 
soveh, or whether it is the juice transformed, by fermentation, into 
intoxicating drink. In accordance with this principle are the facts of 
Hebrew literature. When yayin became generic by usage, the Jews 
had to resort in later time to specific words, such as ahsis and soveh, 
just as the Greeks with their gleukos and the Latins with their mustum, 
when oinos and vinum respectively had become too vague and 
general. As to the ' particular history ' of the words for Wine, the 
body of this work contains scores of illustrations of the fact, that in 
Hebrew, Chaldee, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, Latin, and English, the 
words for wine, in all these languages, are originally, and always 
i?iclusively, applied to 'the blood of the grape' in its primitive and 
natural condition, — as well subsequently, as to that juice both boiled 
and fermented. It is true that one or two ^zw-scientific writers, 
such as Pliny in ancient times (a. d. 60), and Neumann in later 
(1740), have endeavored to override the popular use of the word 
' wine,' and to fabricate a techfiical definition of it. The attempt, 
however, has not only been a total failure in itself, but it may be 
alleged that, had it been ever so successful, it could not in the 
slightest degree have affected the past historical use of the word in 
the Bible, or in dead languages and obsolete idioms. Neither Pliny 
nor Neumann, however, are consistent; for both concede that, 
notwithstanding their closet definitions, unfermented preparations 

# Hear the language of LlEBiG: — " Vegetable juices in general become turbid 
when in contact with the air, BEFORE FERMENTATION commences." {Chemistry 
of Agriculture, 3d Ed.) Thus, it appears, foam or turbidness (what the Hebrews 
called khemer, and applied to the foaming 'blood of the grape') is no proof of 
alcohol being present. 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXI 

were "reckoned, not only among wines (vina), but among sweets 
(dulcia) also ;" and that " several of the Italian wines of this sort are 
called vino-coXXo, or boiled wine." The objection, however, is alto- 
gether impertinent for another reason — namely, that the Bible is not 
a book of Science, dictated in technical and scholastic language, but 
a Book of Life, written for common and wayfaring persons, in the 
language of daily life, of national history, of popular apologue, and 
of glowing prophetic poetry. Its speech is the very antipodes of cut- 
and-dried science ; it is the speech of the people and the age, and can 
only be correctly understood by being interpreted in the light of the 
customs and facts by which both Instructors and Instructed — 
prophets and people — were environed, and of the thoughts in which 
they were alike immersed. On other topics the folly of this objection 
can be seen plainly enough. Who, for example, cares for the Colenso 
quibble, that, in order to generate a contradiction between Scripture 
and Science, would force upon the Mosaic phrase applied to the 
'hare' — chewing the cud (Lev. xi. 6) — the modern technical, anato- 
mical definition ? Yet anti-Temperance critics, to serve their contro- 
versial ends, harp upon the same discordant string. 

In this connection we may note a kindred fallacy concerning ' the 
proper use of terms.' The phrase is not felicitous. All terms, how- 
ever applied, which convey the meaning of the writer to the person 
addressed, are equally 'proper,' since to do that is the sole end of 
speech. There may be degrees of clearness, certainly, but that is 
all ; and this does not involve the question of the primary, secondary, 
figurative, or poetical use of the word. The Bible, like any other 
book, may have all these varied uses. 

In the controversy on the Pentateuch, Dr Colenso asks his critic, 
"With what pretense does Dr McCaul undertake to censure me as 
being ignorant of Hebrew, for saying that the proper signification of 
the word Succah is ' booths made of boughs and branches,' and that 
when it is used of tents, etc., it is used improperly ? His language 
would lead his readers to suppose that the word is used freely for all 
kinds of habitations, lions' lairs, pavilions, tabernacles, etc. The real 
fact is, that the word occurs twenty-three times in the sense of booth) 
or inclosure made of boughs, five times metaphorically, and thrice only 
for tents " (Notes, pp. 8, 9). A precisely parallel argument has been 
formed as to yayin, with the view of narrowing its proper meaning to 
intoxicating wine, — with this difference, that the alleged ' metaphorical ' 
uses are more numerous than the so-called ' proper ' ones ? But no 
matter as to that : the point to be settled is, whether the element of 
number of times a word is used can determine the proper sense of it 
or not. Is it a fact to be settled by counting majorities ? Now 
Dr Kalisch, one of the ' authorities ' quoted by the bishop on the 
same page, distinctly goes against him, for he says, "The context 
alone can decide whether that noun is used in its (narrow) original or 
its wider sense." When it is said that the ark was in ' Succoth,' the 
sense is clearly shown to be wider than ' booth ' or ' branch,' and this 
has nothing *to do with the number of times it is so used. The 



XX11 PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

original meaning of ' candle-stick ' is seen on the face of the phrase 
itself; and when it was so used, for centuries, it properly meant ' a 
stick that holds a candle ' ; but now, for many ages, it has been used 
in a wider sense, but still an equally proper sense, to signify ' a candle- 
holder,' whether the instrument be made of brass, pot, tin, silver, 
gold, or wood. To assert that the Bible word ' golden-candlestick ' 
is a metaphorical term, would be the climax of silliness. On p. 15, how- 
ever, Dr Colenso certainly corrects his critic, but virtually abandons 
his other position. Dr McCaul had said that bechor meant ' firstborn ' 
of ' both father and mother,' instead of ' either,' leaving the meaning 
a little ambiguous. Dr Colenso replies, " No doubt the word is 
usually employed to express 'firstborn son' of the father; but it 
does not mean only this, but may be used when needed to express 
either ' firstborn' of the mother, or 'first-begotten' of the father." 
Both the critics here fall into a bog, for the word itself does not, and 
cannot, express anything about either father or mother. They are 
importing the sense of the context into one of the terms ! Dr Kalisch, 
immediately cited, puts the matter in the right light when he speaks of 
" the ge?ieric appellation bechor. It occurs predominantly (i. e. oftenest) 
in the sense (rather, application to) first-begotten of the father; yet we 
find ' firstborn of the handmaid'' (Exod. xi. 5), 'firstborn which she 
shall bear' (Deut. xxv. 6)." Surely no one will fancy that 'firstborn,' 
in these texts, is either 'metaphorical' or 'improper,' because that 
mode of use is in a minority. On the same page Dr Colenso again 
corrects his critic, and confutes his own absurdity about ' usual ' and 
' proper use.' Dr McCaul having translated khaggim by ' periodical 
feasts ' — thereby importing into the generic word a specific element, — 
his opponent says, " Here, again, Dr McCaul is mistaken ; the 
Hebrew word has no such restricted meaning; it expresses simply 
' feast ' or ' festival ' ; and though it i?iay of course be applied to either 
of the three great feasts, it is used in Exod. x. 9 in the ordinary 
sense before any periodical feast was instituted." This is very sound, 
but then it has nothing to do with ' counting ' texts, nor with exclusive 
meanings, nor with metaphors — but only with the context and the 
nature of things gathered from it.* Let the same course be adopted 
in regard to words for wine, and the bulk of critical defenses of 
drinking will disperse into thinnest air. 

The late Canon Stowell, in his sermon preached before the British 
Association for the Promotion of Science, observes that " superficial 
men create a seeming discord, and then find fault with God's work 

* Curious to say, Dr Colenso is here arguing against 'the usual sense,' as he 
calls it; for khag'vs, twice as often applied to sacred as to common feasts. Dean 
Stanley, in Commentary on 1 Cor. xi. 21, has fallen into the same fallacy concerning 
methuei. He says, " It need not be always taken of intoxication, but this is its 
natural meaning in most passages." That a word for 'fulness' should have the 
meaning of the effect of being full of one special kind of thing seems anything but 
natural. Further, what has the meaning of ' most passages ' to do with its mean- 
ing in a passage not included in the most ? When the word ' man ' is used in 
Kaffirland, it is oftenest in connection with Kaffirs ; but does it, therefore, acquire 
the ' natural meaning ' of ' black man ' ? 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXU1 

instead of their own." This is particularly applicable to the question 
under consideration, where the grossest absurdities have been adopted 
as principles of interpretation. The initial and central fallacy is 
this : — " The word wine is undeniably applied in the Bible to a drink 
that intoxicated men: therefore the word always and necessarily 
means intoxicating liquor " ! We do not here enter into an elaborate 
refutation of this absurd statement, but we must, in some measure, 
remove it out of the way of the impartial consideration of the terms 
for wine, awaiting inquiry; since the principle, if allowed, at once 
begins and ends the whole matter. If there is but one kind of wine — 
i. e. intoxicating, — criticism and argument are at an end, since the use 
of wine of some sort is palpably sanctioned by God in the Bible, and 
not merely permitted.* The fact that words are symbols of wide 
and various application makes it chiefly the business of criticism to 
ascertain what the sense or meaning is in particular passages. The 
very word 'meaning' refers to the idea which it is the medium of 
reaching, and that is not always one object, or one quality, much less 
one class of objects without specific differences. St Jerome, one of 
the earliest of Christian critics, after explaining that bar, while it 
signifies ' a son,' may also be used to designate ' corn ' (barley), as 
well as to denote ' pure,' adds, — " Wherein, then, have I erred, if I 
have translated a term of ambiguous signification in two different 
ways ? — showing my readers how variously a Hebrew word may be 
translated." — ('Apologia adv. Ruff, tome i. col. 729.) The philoso- 
pher Herschel, in his 'Discourse' (1830), says, "What is worst of 
all, some, nay, most words have two or three meanings distinct from 
each other, (so as) to make a proposition true in one sense and false 
in another, or even false altogether" (p. 21). Alexander Carson, D.D., 
in his work on ' Inspiration,' says, "A word may have two senses, or 
more, in different situations, but not two senses in the same occur- 
rence." Dr Davidson, in his 'Text of the Old Testament' (Ed. 1856, 
p. 211), is even more explicit in contradicting the foolish canon of 
the anti-Temperance critic : — 

" The science of words has much uncertainty and vagueness, espe- 
cially in relation to the languages of Scripture; for it must ever be 
difficult to fix with precision a leading idea, abstract and complex as 
it usually is. One might suppose that a Dictionary would render the 
work very easy, inasmuch as it gives the signification of words.t But 
all dictionaries are liable to error, and should be followed with dis- 
crimination. Besides, they can only furnish the general signification, 
whereas the Interpreter wants the precise sense, with its exact shade, 
as determined by the particular position in which it stands." 

Dr W. Freund, in his ' Worterbuch der Lateinischen Sprache ' (1834), 
gives an admirable illustration of the difference of context and etymo- 

* " If we confound the sufferance of events with the Divine sanction of them, 
we are guilty of teaching that God consecrates sin." — ( Dr Cumming: 'God in 
History,' p. 9. 1854.) 

t Webster gives, for example, twenty-one meanings to the word 'spirit.' 



xxiv PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

logy. " The substantive arena changes its sense in the four following 
passages: — (i) Magnus congestus arenae, Lucr. 6, 724; (2) Missum 
in arenam aprum jaculis desuper petiit, Suet. Tibb. 72; (3) Vectio 
Prisco, quantum plurimum potuero, praestabo, praesertim in arena 
mea, hoc est, apud Centum veros, Hin. Ep. 6, 12, 2; (4) Quid 
faces, CEnone? Quid arena semina mandas ? Ovid. Her. 5, 115. 
In the first passage it is actual sand ; in the second, the amphitheater ; 
in the third, the sphere of one's calling ; in the fourth, a proverbial 
expression for something unfruitful" — i. e. something in that respect 
like sand. But it is evident, that while a lexicon-maker may arrange 
these words in a certain order of mental relationship — as (1) literal 
sand; (2) the sanded place of contest; (3) a?iy place of contest or 
activity; (4) what is barren as sand — may give what four names he 
pleases to the words — metonymy, trope, etc., — yet that will make 
no difference as to the plain meaning and intention of the speaker in 
1 using ' these words. The mode in which they are formed does not 
affect their ' meaning ' or use. When Bland, translating the lines of 
Ibycus concerning oinanthides and oinareois, says, — 

' And new-born clusters teem with wine 
Beneath the shadowy foliage of the vine? 

the idea which ' wine ' conveys is as certainly that of ' grape-juice ' 
as if it had been expressed by that phrase. It is used ' proverbially,' 
and hence comes in the principle laid down by Freund, — "The 
word arena, in the proverbial phrase — arena seminam mandere, 
1 commit seed to the sand ' — must always mean ' sand ' ; but in the 
words of Vectio Prisco — prcestabo in arena ?nea — cannot mean ' in my 
sand.' It must remain an indifferent thing for the judgment, what 
verdict the lexicon gives on the word, so long as the whole thought, 
through its application to something not of the nature of husbandry, 
has deviated from the literal [or original] sense." 

The power of the context operates in various ways to modify the 
sense of a passage, or to limit the application of particular words. 
The nature of the subject is part of the context. ' Drink of the cup ' 
must be modified, by the nature of the case, into either ' Drink out 
of the cup the liquor in it,' or Cup must be understood as a ' figure ' 
for its contents ; as ' the sword ' or instrument is put for ' war ' itself. 
But under the nature of the subject is really comprehended the 
purpose of the writer or speaker — the special end he has in view in 
his utterance, — and we cannot be justified in stretching his language 
beyond that point as determined by all the circumstances. The phrase 
occurring in 1 Cor. x., relative to meats offered to idols, supplies a 
clear example: — 'Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, eat 1 (ver. 25). 
It would evidence mental disorder were this to be given as a literal 
command to one's housekeeper in the purchase of beef or mutton in 
the market. People are not to buy inferior or bad meat, still less are 
they to consume what is unwholesome, or may disagree with them. 
When the apostle adds, 'Asking no questions on account of co?iscience] 
a limitation is put upon the command; since the purpose of the 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXV 

instruction is opened out, — and that purpose does not concern the 
qualities of physical things, and the consequent rules that regulate 
their use or disuse, but the quality or state of the mind. To transfer 
the text from the moral to the material sphere is plainly to pervert it. 

We now proceed to give a summary exposition of the chief Hebrew 
terms concerned in this inquiry, based upon a careful induction and 
comparison of Text, Context, and Circumstance, allowing but a 
secondary weight to the remote, vague, and uncertain element of 
etymology. 

i. yn, yayin, 'wine,' occurs 141 times in the Bible. Various 

derivations have been sought for it, likely and unlikely. Some 
lexicon-makers have referred it to an obsolete root signifying 
1 boiling,' and hence ' fermenting ' ; others to a kindred Arabic word, 
yavan, in the sense of molle, ' soft ' ; others to yaven, ' mire,' ' dirt,' 
'obscurity'; others to another Arabic form of the word, denoting 
'dullness.' As Dindorf, however, says, yavan and the kindred 
Arabic denote ' boiling,' ' foaming,' ' spuming,' — and hence the 
derivative yayin would fitly apply to the fresh-expressed and ' foam- 
ing ' blood of the grape. This is confirmed by the Chaldee term for 
wine, khamar, being undoubtedly derived from khemer, 'froth' or 
' foam,' which is applied equally to the froth of the sea, to boiling 
bitumen, and to red fluids. Tt is certain that many vegetable juices 
become red by boiling, as wine does by fermenting. The Penny Cyclo- 
paedia (Art. ' Wine ') observes, " Vegetable juices in general become 
turbid when in contact with air before fermentation commences." 
New names, when first imposed, are always expressive of some simple 
and obvious appearance, never of latent properties or scientific re- 
lations; and hence, while the 'foaming' appearance of grape-juice 
accounts for the original application of the term yayin to it, it would 
be absurd to suppose that the idea of 'fermentation,' the nature of 
which has only been understood during the last century as a 
scientific process, formed any part of the original connotation of 
the word. The Jewish Rabbins, in fact, were so ignorant on this 
point, that they held a foolish theory to the effect that ' grape-juice 
did not ferment' in the same sense as bread, whereas, in fact, the 
principle and process, and the agents and materials concerned, are 
identical. A word, however, like yayin, originally applied to foaming 
grape-juice, would gradually become significant of the juice in the 
subsequent conditions in which it was found, and, by a kind of 
mental retrospection, to the wine confined in the grape. In Neh. 
v. 18 we have the phrase 'all sorts of wine.' As a generic term, 
therefore, yayin became applicable to wine of four species : — 

(a) It is used sometimes in the sense of the vinum pendens of 
the Latins. As Cato speaks of the ' hanging- wine ' (De Re Rustica. 
cxlvii.), so Deut. xxviii. 39 refers to yayin. z& a thing to be gathered 
by men or eaten by worms. In Isa. xvi. 10 and Jer. xlviii. 
it is used for the grapes to be trodden in the vat (see Gesenius 

d 



XXVI PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

under TH""]). ^ n ^ sa - c i v - I S > J er - ^ IO > I2 > possibly in Isa. lv. i ; 

probably in Deut. xiv. 26, it is applied to 'the grape in the cluster.' 
The Rabbins have a similar use of the word. Baal Hatturim, in 
Deut. xvi. n, says, "At Pentecost, when corn is reaped, and wine is 
now in the grapes." In wine countries, the common language 
applied to the growing grapes is, ' the wine-blooms.' The grape-cure 
is called the ' wein cur.' In Spain they say, una buena cosecha de 
vino, 'a good gathering of wine.' — (Father Connelly's Diccionario 
Nuevo, Madrid, 1798.) A traveler in the Pyrenees says, "Flocks of 
sheep and goats enliven the hills ; corn and wine, flax and oil, hang on 
the slopes." — (Collin's Voyages, 1796, p. 82.) 

(b) Yayin as used very frequently for the 'foaming blood of the 
grape' was, as we have said, probably applied to the expressed 
juice because of its turbid appearance. Perhaps the claret-grape, 
which has red juice, suggested the metaphor, " He washed his 
garments in yayin, his clothes in the blood-of-grapes." (Compare 
Gen. xlix. 12 with Isa. lxiii. 1 — 3.) In Job xxxii. 19 the word 
is applied to the must-wine, translated by the Septuagint gleukos. 
Cant. v. 1 (compared with vii. 9) refers to a sweet, innocent yayin, 
which might be drunk ' abundantly ' by young women. A peculiar 
use of the corresponding Chaldee term, khamar, is occasionally found 
in the Targums. ' Wine reserved in its grapes ' (Targum on Cant, 
viii. 2). On Cant. i. 14 we fall back on the other sense: 'They 
took clusters of grapes and pressed wine out of them.' 

(c) In Prov. ix. 2, 5, yayin seems to point to a boiled-wine, or 
syrup, the thickness of which made it needful to mingle water with 
it before drinking: while, unmixed with fluid, it was probably con- 
sumed with milk (Isa. lv. 1; compare vii. 22; Ezek. xxvii. 17). 
"To the honey of raisins," says Baron Bode, "the Persians give 
the name of shire." According to D'Herbelot (1680), the words 
strop, sherbet, etc., came from the Arabic shir-ab [' sweet water '], 
applied to any kind of drink in general. — [Bibliotheque Orientate: 
Art. Sirop.) In the East, sherab to this day includes ' all sorts of 
wine,' sherab-jee signifying 'wine-seller'; but the sense of sirop with 
us undeniably proves the existence of a syrup-wine formerly. The 
Mishna (Terumoth, xi.) shows that, anciently, wine so preserved was 
used in the offerings. " Wine [yayin) of the heave-offering must not be 
boiled, because it lessens it." Bartenora, in a note, says, " For people 
drink less of it," which is true, since boiling renders it richer 
and more cloying. The Mishna adds, " Rabbi Yehuda permits it, 
because it improves it." Such a wine Wisdom prepares, and, on 
the day of her feast, is aptly represented as mingling with water for 
her guests. 

(d ) There was also the yayin mixed with drugs, of various sorts : 
the ' mixed-wine ' of the sensualist, spiced and inebriating ; a cup of 
still stronger ingredients, used as the emblem of Divine judgments, 
the 'cup of malediction' (Psa. lxxv. 8); the 'turbid-wine,' full of 
poison. As Dindorf [Lexicon et Comment., 1804) says, " Yayin khamar, 
vinum fermentescit — calici vino turbido et ve?ienato ple?io, a cup full 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xxvii 

of wine, thick, foaming, and poisonous." Of Deut. xxxii. 33 he 
says, "Khamath taanaim yaynahm, this wine is the poison of dragons 
— venerium draconum ; sermo quo delectantur est noxious, pessimus." 
(e) Yayin was also applied to every species of fermented grape- 
juice. The characters of fermentation are well marked in Prov. 
xxiii. 31, where it is described as 'red' and 'sparkling,' in which 
condition we are forbidden even to look upon it with desire. Not 
in one-half of the 141 texts, however, can it be shown that such 
wine is the kind to which the word is applied, by anything in 
the context. Yayin, then, being accepted as a general term, it 
would follow that we should expect, as time went on, that specific 
terms would be adopted to designate special kinds or states of 
wine, and this is exactly what we find to be the case in the later 
books. 

2. Q^DJJ, ahsis, occurs in five texts, — Cant. viii. 2; Isa. xlix. 26; 

Joel i. 5; hi. (Heb. iv.) 18; Amos ix. 13. The word is plainly con- 
nected with ahsas, ' to tread,' and denotes ' something trodden out.' 
It is grape-juice purely; and never seems to have acquired the 
ambiguous meaning of the Greek gleukos and the Latin mustum, 
which were undoubtedly sometimes applied to the juice of grapes 
in an initial state of fermentation. Joel hi. 18, 'the mountains 
shall drop down new wine ' (ahsis), is not all a figure. Pallas says, in 
1793, of the grapes in the Hungarian vintage, "In August they 
ripen, burst, and begin to evacuate their juice. The Shirnoi contains 
a rich juice, and bursts when ripe." — (Travels, i. p. 314.) Professor 
Douglas rightly says that " the passage, ' they shall be drunken with 
their own blood as with sweet-wine,' is no proof that must, which 
is unintoxicating, cannot here be meant ; for neither is blood intoxi- 
cating: but all the meaning that the verb conveys is, to drink till 
one is satiated or cloyed. ' Ahsis of the Pomegranate ' is an evidence 
that the word was sometimes used in that width of meaning which 
the etymology sanctioned." — (Fairbairn's Imperial Bible Dictionary, 
p. 1097. Glasgow, 1866.) 

3. fc^Q, soveh or sobhe, from sabha, ( to drink to satiation,' occurs 

but thrice. It is chiefly interesting as affording a link of connection 
between classical wines and those of Judea, through an obviously 
common name, being identical with the Greek hepsema, the Latin 
sapa, and the modern Italian and French sabe, 'boiled grape-juice.' 
The inspissated wines called defrutum and syrczum were, according 
to Pliny (xiv. 9), a species of it : the last name singularly suggests 
the instrument in which it was prepared — the syr or caldron 
(Nahum i. 10). "The property of organic substances," says Liebig, 
" to pass into a state of decay, is annihilated in all cases by heating 
to the boiling-point." Columella tells us of the kind of degeneration 
to which such preparations were subject. "Defrutum, however 
carefully made, is liable to grow acid" (xii. 20). To this corre- 
sponds the statement of Hos. iv. 8 — 'Their sove is sour! Such 



j 

xxviii PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

preparations are made in great quantities in the East, in Calabria, 
and in the south of France, to this day. (See Works of Dr Lees, ii. 
p. 144.) 

4- HDO' khatnar, is the Chaldee equivalent of the Hebrew yayin, 

and occurs only in Ezra and Daniel. Its derivation is from the 
Hebrew khe7ner (see Deut. xxxii. 14 ; Psa. lxxv. 8), which may be 
translated foaming, or turbid, or as we say in English, ' yesty,' barmy, 
scummy. It has, therefore, a very wide application, and its meaning 
comprehends ' all sorts of wine,' without shutting us up to any in par- 
ticular. 

5. VDJTj khometz, is simply ' sour-wine,' vinegar, ' sick-wine,' wine 

1 gone ' sour. It was, no doubt, chiefly applied to the thin sour drink 
made from the last pressure of the grapes, with water added, and was, 
like the Roman posca, something halfway between ginger-beer and 
French vin-ordinaire. In the East, the term koumiss is applied to fer- 
mented, sour mare's or camel-milk. The word had a somewhat broad 
application to sour and fermented things. 

6. ^i^Tl' tirosh, is not ' wine ' at all, but ' the fruit of the vine- 
yard ' in its natural condition. The vine says, ' Shall I leave my 
tirosh ? ' ' They shall tread tirosh, but shall not drink yayin.' Nothing 
but a foregone conclusion, fostered by the mistranslation of ancient 
and modern versions — versions which traditionally sustain and deceive 
each other — could have hindered scholars from perceiving the true 
sense of this word. Neither Versions nor Lexicons, however, have 
been consistent. The Septuagint, the Chaldee Targums, the Syriac, 
Arabic, Vulgate, etc., have, in one text or another, rendered the word 
as 'berry,' 'vines,' 'vintage,' 'fruit,' 'grapes,' etc. On Micah vi. 15, 
Julius Bate, M. A., in his ' Critica Hebrasa,' 1767, observes, "Hence 
it is plain that tirosh is what is pressed, the grapes." Gesenius, in 
three texts, renders it ' grapes,' and so others. 

Tirosh is perhaps correctly derived from yarash, ' to possess, to 
inherit,' just as Hierusalem is from yerash and salem = ' possession of 
peace.' Drusius, in 16 17, commenting on Gen. xxvii. 28, observes 
that " the idea of ' possession ' is implied in tirosh, because amongst 
those things which a man possessed by inheritance, vintage-produce was 
the chief, and received this name by way of distinction."* 

* The note in Kitto's 'Pictorial Bible' (Ed. 1847), objecting to our derivation, 
alleges that "the grape could not be more important to the Jews than the goose- 
berry to us " ! and further, that it is "unlikely that the solid products of the vine 
should be so conspicuously placed beside corn " ! ! If the reader will peruse three 
texts, selected at intervals, he will perceive how very far vinous prejudice will lead 
critics to ignore the plainest facts. Numb. xvi. 14, " Given us inheritance of fields 
and vineyards." Lev. xxvi. 4, 5, " The land shall yield its produce \_corn\, the 
trees give their fruit. Your threshing [of corn] shall reach unto your vintage." 
Isa. xvi. 9, "Joy is taken out of the plentiful field ; in the vineyards there shall be 
no shouting." In Micah vi. 15, sowing seed of corn, and treading olives and grapes, 
all occur together, side by side. What is the present condition of things in Bible 
lands ? The Rev. Smylie Robson, missionary at Damascus, thus writes, after 
noticing corn and olives : — " The fruit of the vine is the only other kind which can 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXIX 

Those who give to the word the meaning of mustum, grape-juice, 
and then add, by way of explanation, that it is " a strong wine which 
gets possession of a matis head, and drives him out of himself," not 
only invent a fiction and contradict demonstrable facts, but contra- 
vene the clear context of every passage wherein the word occurs, 
which in no instance whatever is connected with inebriety. Out of 
thirty-eight texts in which tirosh is found, in thirty it is associated 
with corn (not bread), in one (Micah vi. 15) with olives, in twenty-one 
with orchard-fruit, and in twenty with both corn and fruit. It is 
never once connected with shemen, 'oil,' though Smith's ' Bible 
Dictionary ' erroneously states the contrary ; it is only thrice found in 
the company of ' wine,' and then by way of distinction, as a different 
thing ; and it is constantly associated with ' dew,' ' rain,' ' dryness,' 
and other conditions affecting natural ' growth.' Within the compass 
of philology there is hardly any word which, by the conjoint evidence 
of etymology, context, and circumstance, is more clearly shown to be 
a collective term expressive of a class of natural produce. The notion 
that tirosh signifies the same as ahsis, or the alternative supposition, 
that this latter should have been invented when the former was in 
constant use for the same idea, is simply incredible. 

That V[™1> dahgan, denotes growing ' corn ' in general, and not 

some species of grain, as 'wheat' or 'barley,' has never been ques- 
tioned. That it denotes an artificial preparation like 'bread' or 
'cake' has never been imagined. Yet this term is found in per- 
petual association, under common natural conditions favoring or 
opposing growth and increase, with tirosh. ^HU 1 * yitzhar, is a 
second term, twenty-one times used in connection with tirosh. It is 
derived, as Dindorf, Gesenius, and others admit, from a root signifying 
to ' shine,' ' glisten,' like the Spanish term azahar, ' orange-flower,' 
and the Latin aurantium, for the shining orange class of fruits. The 
oliveyards also shine and glisten in the sun ; hence we have suggested 
' olive-and-or chard-fruit ' as the English equivalent of 'yitzhar, completing 
a beautiful triad of natural blessings — (1) Corn-fruit, (2) Vine-fruit (3) 
Orchard-fruit ; or, in other words, the produce of field, vineyard, and 
orchard. Agreeing with Professor Douglas, that " a common deriva- 
tion of tirosh from the verb to ' take possession,' because it intoxicates, 
is too arbitrary to deserve serious refutation " (' Imperial Bible 
Dictionary,' p. 1097), we accept the sense of 'vine-fruit' as that 
demonstrated by induction, and giving a meaning which at once fits 
every context and honors the Divine word. (For further evidence, 
see ' Works of Dr Lees,' vol. ii.) 

be said to form a substantial part of the food of the people. . . . From August 
to December, bread and grapes are, substantially, the food of the people. . . . 
It is perfectly safe to eat grapes constantly to satiety. Grapes are dried in large 
quantities. There is another form in which the fruit of the vine is preserved for 
use. By pickling and beating, a substance called dibs [debhash, artificial honey- 
cake] is made out of the grapes. . . . It is only ignorance which would pare 
away and attenuate scriptural expressions." — Missionary Herald of the Presby- 
terian Church in Ireland, 1845. See this testimony more at length on page 93 of 
the Notes. 



XXX PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

7- ^p" 1 ' y e $&* (Arab, 'ukeb, cavum esse), originally a ' cavity,' • coop, 

or vat in which grapes or olives were put for the purpose of being 
trodden ; but perhaps, secondarily, by becoming generic for the whole 
apparatus {tota machind), the lacus or cavity into which the wine and 
oil flowed {in quern vinum expressum defluit). So Dindorf, who cites 
Hesychius — leenos hopou staphulee pateitai. Gesenius also accepts 
the double sense of yeqev. J. D. Paxton, the American, says of 
Bhadoom, " Several [fruit] houses seem to be common property, 
where they express the juice of the grape. They have a row of large 
vats, into which the grapes are thrown ; and beside these some stone 
troughs, into which the juice flows. Men get into the vats, and tread 
the grapes. . . . They take the juice from the troughs and put 
it into large boilers, reduce it to one-half" {Travels, p. 215). Capt. 
Colville Frankland says of Solima, "The grapes are trodden out 
upon a kind of stone platform ; the juice, running off through a little 
channel, is received in a basin cut in the rock, from whence it is carried 
in buckets to the boiler, where it is skimmed, and allowed to cool. It 
is boiled and cooled twice, and then put into great earthen jars, and 
becomes a rich syrup" {Travels, ii. p. 10, 1827). Prof. Murphy of 
Belfast, in order to prove the liquidity of tirosh, has narrowed the 
sense of yeqev to that of the ' must-lake,' or hypoleenos, but without any 
reason or even good authority. It occurs sixteen times, and in most 
of the texts is more appropriately referred to the upper than the under 
vat. In Numb, xviii. 27, 30; Deut. xv. 14; xvi. 13; 2 Kings vi. 27; 
Hos. ix. 2, it is associated with ' corn ' and the ' threshing-floor.' In 
Job xxiv. 11 it is plainly the place of treading shriveled grapes that 
yield no wine to quench thirst. In Isa. v. 2 it is used for the whole 
of the apparatus, not for part of it — much less for the last part to the 
exclusion of the first! In Isa. xvi. 10, to avoid giving to 'yayin' its 
natural contextual sense of grape, the translators are compelled to 
insert i out 1 and 'z';z/<?'! In Jer. xlviii. ^ there is no need to under- 
stand liquid ' wine,' but ' gathered-wine,' of which the prophet speaks 
in chap. xl. In Hos. ix. 2 it is associated with ' feeding.' In Joel 
iii. 13 it is conjoined as a general term with pj, gath, probably this 
having reference to the oil (shemen = Gethsemene), and yeqev to 
grape-fruit, which, in its abundance, is awaiting the 'treading.' In 
Hag. ii. 16 it is associated with n™TD> P oora h, an d with 'heaps' of 
corn and fruit. " When one came to the yeqev to take fifty (clusters), 
the poorah, ' the Fruit-house,' had but twenty." A more baseless 
assumption than that yeqev signifies either often or solely the wine- 
trough, was never made in support of another baseless assumption — 
viz., that tirosh was the liquid trodden out, and not the fruit ' trodden.' 
7nesek, ' a mixture,' is of course applicable to many mix- 



tures; of wine with water, or with aromatics, or with drugs. The 
verb is used in Prov. ix. 2, where ' Wisdom mingles her wine,' doubt- 
less with water ; certainly not making that ' mixed- wine ' in relation to 
which she pronounces ' woe ' to those that ' seek ' it. In Cant. viii. 2 
we find the kindred term mezeg, translated ' liquor ' ; and in Prov. xxiii. 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xxxi 

30; Isa. lxv. 11, we have memsach, respectively rendered 'mixture' 
and (inferentially) ' drink-offering.' 

9- nt^&SW' ashishah, perhaps from a root signifying ' fire,' denotes 

a cake of dried grapes. " By universal consent," says Prof. Douglas, 
" it is now understood to be some kind of cake, probably a cake of 
dried fruit." It occurs in 2 Sam. vi. 19; 1 Chron. xvi. 3; Cant. i. 5; 
Hos. hi. 1 ; and is unfortunately rendered ' flagons ' and ' flagons of 
wine.' 

10. O^DJ27> shemarim, 'preserves,' from shamar, l to preserve,' — as 

shemdnim, ' fat things,' from shemen, ' fat ' or oil. Our oldest trans- 
lators rendered it better than the modern. Coverdale renders ' sweet 
things'; the Bishop's Bible (1568), 'delicate things'; Forerius and 
Grotius, ' a feast of vine-fruit ' (vindemia). Preserves form an essential 
part of Oriental feasts : * They eat the fat {shemen) and drink the 
sweet 1 (Neh. viii. 10). 

11. -Q££?, shakar, 'saccharine drink,' is related to the word for 

T -- 

sugar in all the Indo- Germanic and Semitic languages, and is still 
applied throughout the East, from India to Abyssinia, to the palm 
sap, the zhaggery made from it, to the date-juice and syrup, as well as 
to sugar and to the fermented Palm wine. It has, by usage, grown 
into a generic term for ' drinks,' including fresh juices and inebriating 
liquors, other than those coming from the grape. [See ' Works ' of 
Dr Lees, ii. 1853, Art. 'Strong drink,' Art. 'Wine,' etc., for abundant 
illustrations, and for refutation of Fuerst's derivation.] Mr Palgrave, in 
his ' Arabia,' says, having bought for three farthings a handkerchief 
full of ' delicious ' dates, " we hung it up from the roof-beam to pre- 
serve the luscious fruit from the ants, and it continued to drop molten 
sweetness into a sugary pool on the floor for three days together " (i. 
p. 253). Such a beverage was rightly called shakar, and naturally and 
necessarily produced that satisfaction and cloying fullness which is 
well expressed by the cognate verb, and which has its parallel in 
the history of the corresponding Greek words, methuein from methu, 
' sweet wine,' ' mead,' etc.* The force of the prophet's words may be 
understood from considering this, the etymological and primary sense 
of shakar: — 

'The sweet dtink shall become bitter to them that drink it.' 

II. Our second proposition assumes a more positive form — viz., 

that the Bible teaches, clearly and fully, by a series of continuous 

and consistent testimonies, that intoxicating drink is an evil article ; 

poisonous to the body, seductive to the soul, and corrupting to the 

* The views taken of these words were generally adopted in Dr Eadie's Bible 
Cyclopcedia, especially as to tirosh and yitzhar, and the generic sense of shakar 
and yayin. They were all incorporated in Kitto's Cyclopcedia of Biblical Literattire 
(1845), the first Edition, the only one truly called Kitto's; and they have been 
entirely adopted and admirably sustained in Bastow's Bible Dictionary, and in 
Dr Fairbairn's Imperial Bible Dictionary (1866). 



XXXll PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

circumstances of man : or, to put the idea in another shape, we hold 
that the Bible vindicates its claim to Inspiration by having anticipated 
on this point the fullest witness of Science, and having exhausted the 
teachings of human History ^ 

And here will naturally start up, in defense of palatable Error, all 
the hydra forms of prejudice and convention ; for it is very hard for 
the fleshly lusts and fashions of the world to bow before even Divine 
truth. Yet — appealing to a World that at least ' professes ' to believe 
in the fact that God has spoken in His word — why should our 
proposition startle and convulse it ? What other branch of practical 
morals is there on which it is more needful that God should have 
instructed mankind, by precept, by warning, and by example ? Why, 
then, are the people and the preachers so loth to receive the teach- 
ings, or so bitter in their condemnation of the proposition itself,— so 
ingenious in the invention of objections, yet withal so illogical in 
their criticism and so intolerant of inquiry ? Dr Steudel, in his essay 
on ' Inspiration,' puts a serious question : — " To appropriate the 
Spirit, I must renounce my own inclinations, and give a real consent 
to all the Word presents as true. Why refuse homage to just that 
part of the Divine wisdom to which our own depravity cares not to 
consent ? " 

It is not enough, then, that we have ' the Scriptures to search ' ■ we 
must come to the search in a proper moral attitude. We must come, 
not for confirmation of opinion, which is pride, but for purity of life, 
which is true profit. Our aim must be both Truth and Good. It 
may be asked here, therefore, without offense, whether he who seeks 
to justify the use of alcoholic beverages by the Scripture, is not very 
liable to a sensuous bias in his interpretation ? If God's works and 
law — manifested in experience and science — cannot justify drinking, 
is it not very wrong to rush to His Word ? May not the wish be 
father to the thought? The objector is not merely defending his 
own practices, and pleading for his own appetites; he is, even more 
than the Abstainer, liable to the bias of Opinion. The difference is 
this, that the drinker's opinion is an old and inherited one, sanctioned 
by a life-time of custom ; ours, a newly acquired belief, the result of 
inquiry and experience. Let us, then, in coming to this investigation, 
strive honestly to desire to know the Divine will, and implore the 
aid and purifying influence of 'the Spirit of Truth.' Let us seek 
to place ourselves before the Word, so that its declarations may be 
photographed upon the soul. In the language of Bishop Ellicott, 
in ' Aids to Faith,' " Pray against that bias which, by importing its 
own foregone conclusions into the Word of Scripture, and by refusing to 
see, or to acknowledge, what makes against its own prejudices, has 
proved the greatest known hindrance to all fair interpretation; and 
has tended, more than anything else in the world, to check the free 
course of Divine truth" (p. 421). Nothing has surprised us more, on 
the part of professed Christians, than their reluctance to receive any 
principle which would harmonize Science and Scripture on this subject, 
and their extreme anxiety not to ascertain what appears to us the 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xxxill 

plain meaning of Scripture, but to discover some critical process 
whereby it may be evaded. 

Passing, however, from general prejudices, moral and intellectual, 
let us enumerate and expose a few of the commonest, but most 
operative, false assumptions and delusive principles of interpretation. 

i. "The Church," says the Objector, "is against the Abstinence 
theory. It has known all about the Scriptures, and it has universally 
supposed that intoxicating wine is good, in moderation. That 
abstainers should have found a new light is incredible. We cannot 
suppose so many doctors of the Church, and such myriads of pious 
Christians, to have been in error or sin." 

In this series of assumptions, each particular is deceptive. There 
always have been abstainers in the Christian Church, and we profess 
to have found no new light, but to be illuminated by the old, old 
lamp. Two questions are involved in this objection: (i) Is the 
Bible an exhausted book? (2) Has the professing Church ever erred 
in its dogmas and practices ? To put the questions is to answer them, 
but we will do more. 

On the first point, there is a consensus of opinion, whatever that 
may be worth. The Roman Catholic Church expressly claims the 
power to decide on controverted points of Biblical Theology, and has 
so decided recently on the Immaculate Conception. Amongst Theo- 
logians of the English and Genevan Churches, and the Dissenting 
bodies, take the following : — 

Robinson, in Address to the Pilgrim Fathers, says — "If God reveal anything 
to you by any other instrument of His, be as ready to receive it as ever you were 
to receive any truth by my ministry ; for I am verily persuaded — I am very confi- 
dent — the Lord hath more truth yet to break forth out of His 
Holy Word." 

The Hon. Robert Boyle (1680) says: — "As the Bible was not written for 
any one particular time or people, ... so there are many passages very useful, 
which will not be found so these many ages ; being possibly reserved by the Pro- 
phetic Spirit that indited them ... to quell so?ne foreseen heresy, ... or 
resolve some yet unformed doubts, or confound some error that hath not yet a 
name." 

Bishop Butler, in his Analogy (1737), says: — "Nor is it at all incredible, 
that a Book which has been so long in the possession of mankind, should yet con- 
tain many truths as yet undiscovered. For all the same phenomena and the same 
faculties of investigation from which such great discoveries in natural knowledge 
have been made in the present and last age, were equally in the possession of man- 
kind several thousand years before. And possibly it might be intended that 
events, as they come to pass, should open and ascertain the meaning of several 
parts of Scripture." 

The Interpreter (1862) says : — "A day is coming, when Scripture, long darkened 
by traditional teaching, too frequently treated as an exhausted mine, will at length 
be recognized in its true character, as a field rich in unexplored wealth, and conse- 
quently be searched afresh for its hidden treasures." 

Vinet, in his Lectures, says: — "Even now, after eighteen centuries of Chris- 
tianity, we may be involved in some tremendous error, of which the Christianity 
of the future will make us ashamed." 

Dean Stanley says : — " Each age of the Church has, as it were, turned over a 
new leaf in the Bible, and found a response to its own wants. We have a leaf still 
to turn — a leaf not the less new because it is so simple." 

e 



XXXIV PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

On the second point — that of Authority — take the following : — 

The Church Article, XXL, on General Councils, says : — " They 
may err, and sometimes have erred, even in things pertaining to 
God." While Art. XX., on Church Authority, says: — "It is not 
lawful for the Church to ordain anything that is contrary to God's 
word written ; neither may it so expound one place of Scripture that 
it be repugnant to another." If, for example, the Church were to 
decree that 'a wife of whoredom' (Hos. i. 2) was the same sort of 
woman as 'the prudent wife from the Lord' (Prov. xix. 14), it would 
"so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another;" 
but how could it be more repugnant than to explain that ' the cup of 
blessing ' contained that sort of wine which is a ' mocker,' a ' deceiver,' 
a 'poison,' and which 'biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an 
adder'? Dr Edward Williams, in his 'Equity and Sovereignty,' 
observes that "the greatest of uninspired men have sometimes 
deviated from the narrow path of truth, and all are liable to deviate, 
through the remains of prejudice, and the want of closer search under 
the teachings of celestial wisdom" (p. 397). Professor S. Lee, in his 
1 Hebrew Grammar,' points out that, " under the synthetical method 
— i. e. the mere propounding of certain rules, which might be true 
or false, and which in cases innumerable were not true — most men 
eventually discover that they can pronounce with certainty on 
scarcely anything connected with the letter of the Hebrew Bible. 
The only foundation that can safely be relied on is, that of the 
nature of things, considered in conjunction with real Oriental usage." 
Bishop Ellicott, in 'Aids to Faith,' has an admission even more to 
the purpose: — "Experience teaches us that there is a very large 
residuum of less important passages in which interpreters break up 
into groups, and in which the Expositor of the nineteenth century has 
to yield to the guidance oi principles perhaps but recently recognized, yet 
from their justice and truth, of an influence and authority that cannot 
be gainsaid. There are, indeed, even a few cases, but confessedly 
unimportant, where the modern interpreter has to oppose himself to 
every early version and every patristic commentator, and where it is 
almost certain he is right in so doing" (p. 390). 

2. "When the word is the same, the thing is the same; if, there- 
fore, 'wine' means intoxicating-wme in the cases of Noah and Lot, it 
must mean the same when used by David in the Psalms, and by the 
Evangelist in the Gospel narrative of the changing of water into wine."* 

Certainly not, we answer. Any lexicon or dictionary in any 
language will refute the assumption in almost any page. See under 
such words as Creation, Spirit, House, Angel, Gun, etc. Not, as we 
have shown, that words have so many different meanings, but so 
many different applications. Take a familiar Bible word — Ruakh, 

* Singular to say, in the first learned sermon ever preached and printed against 
abstinence, this was the argument ; and it is the staple of all others to this day. 
The Rev. W. H. Medhurst, on January 30th, 1838, said: — "As Noah and others 
got drunk with yayin (wine), yayin MUST, in every text, mean a fermented liquor." 
No advance has been made upon the logic and criticism of this position. 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXXV 

_____ — ______ 1 , _ , 

'spirit,' in three texts: (i) "God made a ruakh to pass over the 
earth;" (2) "Pharaoh's ruakh was troubled in the morning;" (3) 
"A ruakh came forth and stood before the king" — Ahab. Here 
one word is suggestive of •three distinct things and ideas; and the 
word has several other applications. As regards a general term, the 
context only can show to what it is applied, and so suggest the 
species intended. Wine, for example, is ' the juice of grapes ' — 
quite irrespective of the change that comes over it in fermentation; 
just as the word 'doctor' means, in common usage, 'a learned man,' 
quite irrespective of his special diploma as physician, surgeon, 
apothecary, or divine. As with the words 'man,' 'doctor,' 'spirit,' 
'wife,' so with wine; it is not the word itself, but the context that 
defines (if at all) what sort of man, doctor, spirit, wife, or wine it is 
— good, bad, or indifferent. Theologians, writing against Colenso, 
at once become sensible on this point, though they go back to the 
false position as soon as the 'wine-bottle' comes on to the board. 
Professor J. L. Porter, of Belfast, thus expounds the fact and law : — 
" The Hebrew word baith does not necessarily signify a ' house ' [as 
in Beth-lekhem, the house of bread]. In Gen. xxvii. 15; Exod. xxiii. 
19; 1 Kings xxiii. 7, etc., it means a 'tent.' At the present day the 
Bedawy Arab uniformly calls his ' tent ' belt — i. e. a ' house,' — though 
the proper Arabic word for ' tent ' is kheimeh [home] ; and he speaks 
of the 'door' of his 'house,'" — which, with all due respect to Dr 
Porter, shows that belt is also as correct a term for tent as any other. 
This notion of 'proper use' is a crotchet of scholars, traditionally 
adopted and repeated. 'Prevent' was as proper when used for 
'helping' as it is now when used for 'hindering.' 

It is not generally difficult to see the truth on questions when the 
purse and the passions are not concerned. For example, the English 
Church organ called the Record, for January 9th, 1861, had a long 
review of Dr Cheever's book on 'The Guilt of Slavery,' which, on 
that topic, argues on precisely the same principles that we have 
applied, for thirty years, to the drink question. The Record thus 
welcomes Dr Cheever's endeavor : — 

"We have had occasion to observe the tendency among Biblical 
commentators to traditional interpretation of Scripture. In the 
present instance the result has been to obscure altogether, and, in fact, 
to reverse the teaching of the Book. We must look behind the word- 
to see the nature of the thing. There is no word for ' slave ' to be 
found in the whole Bible, either Hebrew or Greek, paradoxical as 
this statement may appear to most of our readers; no word which 
means, distinctively and only, what we mean by 'slave.' The Hebrew 
word (obedh) includes service of every kind; and the condition of 
service cannot be learned from the word itself." 

In like manner, the Hebrew generic word for wine (yayin) includes 
grape-juice in many states, and the special quality cannot be learned 
from the word itself. There is no word for fermented wine in the 
Bible, no word meaning only that; much less is there such a word 
associated with God's approval, implicit or explicit. It is enough for 



XXXVI PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

us that in no case where wine is named as a blessing does anything 
occur in the context indicating alcoholic quality, but in very many 
cases the reverse; while, on the contrary, it is beyond denial that 
Divine displeasure is very frequently a&ociated with intoxicating 
drink. 

3. "But good men used intoxicating wine, for they got drunk; there- 
fore this is equivalent to God's sanctioning it." 

This dogma is refuted by the stating of it. It would equally justify 
polygamy and slavery, for both were permitted; nay even laws were 
made, not to abolish, but to regulate them. Not only does this 
criticism prove too much; we have the highest authority for rejecting 
its principle, since He who spake as never man spake has declared 
that the lust was suffered, not because it was good, but "because of 
the hardness of the heart." The Divine light comes to men by dis- 
creet degrees, as their mental vision is somewhat prepared for it — a 
truth that refutes the next and kindred fallacy. 

4. "What is not entirely prohibited is partially sanctioned." 
According to this, the harmony of slavery with Christianity is indis- 
putably proved from the Bible, inasmuch as St Paul, writing to 
Onesimus, a slave, never told him to run away ! # 

This fallacy, however, appears in so many Protean forms, that it 
will be useful to give various illustrations of its supreme absurdity. 

(1) The law which declares that 'thou shalt not kill' does not 
mean or imply that half killing is right. 'Thou shalt not commit 
adultery,' interpreted by our Lord, does not mean that we shall 
indulge in ' Platonic love,' but rather that the remotest desire leading 
to the act shall be suppressed. He who says you shall not go to Z 
certainly does not either assert or mean that you shall go to K or L. 
(2) The universal usage of language, ancient and modern, sacred and 
secular, refutes this distorted principle of interpretation. Alexis, in 
his 'Fanatic' (in Athenaeus), has this passage: — "I think some of 
those I meet will blame me for being drunk so early in the day." 
Will any one hence conclude that to be drunk later in the day was 
not at all blameworthy in popular estimation? In Eccles. vii. 
17, the command, 'Be not overmuch (rahvah) wicked,' cannot surely 
be equivalent to 'Be moderately wicked.' If the reprobation of 
'excess of riot' and ' superfluity of naughtiness' does not involve 
eulogy on a i little riot' and a i little naughtiness,' why should a cau- 
tion against ' excess of wine ' mean or imply a commendation of ' a 
little wine'Pf In 'The Last of the Barons,' by Bulwer (Lord Lytton), 
we read the following prayer, put into the mouth of a knight: — 
" From <?z;<?r-gluttony, from ^^r-winebibbing, may the saints ever keep 

*The true meaning of Paul lies on the surface. [See the comment on the 
Epistle to Philemon.] For further illustration of these fallacies, see Dr Lees' 
' Refutation of Professor Murphy ' (1868). See this ' Commentary,' p. 379. 

t The celebrated Robinson, of Cambridge, in his 'Notes to Claude,' has wittily 
and deservedly ridiculed the kind of criticism we are confuting, in a passage sup- 
posed to be addressed to a congregation of clerics : — "Reverend brethren! Let 
me advise you to get drunk. You will perhaps think me doubly drunk in giving 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xxxvii 

Raoul de Fulke and his sons ! " (Chap, i.) None but the purblind 
could thence infer .that any ' gluttony/ or any ' wine-bibbing,' was 
right. (3) The application of this principle to other scriptural 
injunctions would lead to absurdity and immorality. ' Despise not 
thy mother when she is old' (Prov. xxiii. 22), would become a charter 
for despising our mothers when young! 'Oppress not the afflicted 
within thy gate ' (Prov. xxii. 22), would be a license for wrong outside 
our doors! Once, in a Scottish paper, we saw an advertisement 
from a person to the effect that he wanted a second wife, though the 
first was living; alleging that he was only a deacon, and therefore 
the command to the bishop, 'husband of one wife,' so far from 
applying to him, implied that two might ±>e the right thing for a non- 
bishop! Weisinger, the continuator of Olshausen's Commentary, 
says expressly, " The qualification, ' husband of one wife,' professedly 
implies a special reference to the bishop, for this is not required of 
all." The morality of our age, the instincts of purity, fortunately 
unite in repudiating this monstrous distortion of language. He adds, 
"Abstinence, prudence, and modesty denote qualities such as especi- 
ally befit a bishop." Very true, but the correct inference is not that 
other people are exempt from the obligation and advantages of those 
virtues because they are, for special reasons, imposed in the mandatory 
shape on bishops. 

5. "But," persist other objectors, "the fact that the apostles direct 
deacons and deaconesses not to be given to much wine, certainly 
implies that some intoxicating wine is permissible, if it does not pro- 
nounce it to be good." # 

This is a treble mistake, — of history, of inference, and of criticism. 
For (1) it assumes that, in fact, nothing but intoxicating wine was 
abused or capable of abuse in antiquity, which is contrary to the 
plainest testimony. When Cratinus in his ' Ulysseses,' quoted by 
Athenaeus (hi. 56), says, — 

"You were all day glutting yourselves with white milk"; 
and Solomon declares that * much honey is not good'; we must 
assume at once the fact of abuse, and the non-alcoholic nature of the 
substances abused. Amphis, in his 'Uranus,' says, — 
" Sating herself till eve with every dainty," 
which is a phrase parallel to the well-known line of Isaiah, — 
"Tarry till night, till wine inflame them," 

you such advice. But good men have got drunk. Noah was a good man ; Lot 
was a good man ; yet they both got drunk. You tell me our Lord said, 'Be not 
overcharged with drunkenness.' Mind, He did not say, Do not get drunk, but 'be 
not overcharged with it. ' Now can't you get drunk without being dead drunk ? 
But, you reply, St Paul says, ' Be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess. ' 
Observe here, again, he does not say, 'Be not drunk,'' but 'be not excessively 
drunk.' Observe, too, he says, 'Be not drunk with wine,'' — he does not prohibit 
spirits. So you may get drunk on beer, or brandy, even to excess, without 
violating this injunction." In the old English poem of Piers Plowman, in the ale- 
house scene, the goodwife charges her daughter not to get drunk often, for that 
would be a reproach to her. Is the modern inference just, that occasional crapu- 
lence would be meritorious or innocent ? 



XXXVlll PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

but conveying no idea of intoxicating quality. Fondness for gorging, 
with sweets and dainties, was one of the vices of the ancient Greeks. 
Damoxenus, in his ' Syntrophe' (Ath. iii. 61), says they — 

"Who look most solemn in the promenades, 
Know, for all that, the fish's daintiest part, 
And make men marvel at their gluttony." 

Hence (2) the inference falls to the ground, because the historic 
premiss is a network too wide for the special fact ; and it is, moreover, 
not valid in form. (3) The critical blunder is exposed in this Com- 
mentary, p. 368. 

There are also numerous assumptions, which we may designate 
specially as false facts of interpretation, to which the tippling critics 
cling with an absurd tenacity. A few samples must here suffice : for 
others we refer to the text of our Commentary. 

1. The Saturday Review, in noticing a pamphlet by a provincial 
physician, says : — " ^fermented wine is a myth; the pure blood of 
the grape is but a transient product of the vine — and, in the words of 
Dr Barclay, '■quite wipossible 1 to preserve"! 

Now we have not only preserved such wine, imported from 
Florence, for sixteen years together, but we have induced an able 
chemist to prepare such wine extensively for both medical and 
sacramental uses ; hence, if Dr Barclay be right, so far from miracles 
having ceased, their product can be purchased at 24s. per dozen. 
The ' impossible ' has been achieved ; and in the Exhibition Book of 
Prizes this impossible wine actually received ' honorable mention.'* 
For many years past such wine has also b^en made at a vineyard in 
the neighborhood of Cincinnati. Inspissated wine has been spoken of 
in all ages, and is amongst the commonest products of wine countries, 
and is still called sabe. A respected minister amongst the Society of 
Friends, Mr Robert Alsop, in a letter to ourselves, under the date of 
1 86 1, thus writes: — 

" The syrup of grape-juice is an article of domestic manufacture in 
almost every house in the vine districts of the south of France. It is 
simply the juice of the grape boiled down to the consistence of 
treacle. This syrup is, in those parts, the common medium for 
making family preserves ; and a great variety of fruit and other vege- 
table products are so embalmed, such as fresh figs, almonds, peaches, 
plums, melons, pumpkins, tomatoes, etc. As to the use of [ordinary] 
wine, it is almost entirely confined to the men. It is proverbial that 
if a young woman is known to be in the habit of using it, she is 
unlikely to receive proposals of marriage." 

2. It is frequently urged, "The old wine is better than the new, 
and therefore owes its superiority to the process of fermentation." 

* Dr Hassall's report in the Lancet contains the following passage: — "Mr F. 
Wiight (of Kensington) exhibits what he calls Sacramental or Passover wine, 
which consists of the unfermented juice of the grape, and is made to meet the views 
of those ministers who believe that the wine used at the institution of the Sacra- 
ment was unfermented, and consisted simply of the expressed juice of the grape. 
It forms a very palatable beverage." 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. XXXIX 

This is an inference from a solitary premiss, and therefore invalid. 
The objector probably assumes that nothing but alcohol can give 
superior flavor. This is a mistake, since unfermented wine also 
improves by age, for a reason well known to chemists. In the 
preparation of scents and other volatile principles, as well as in the 
bottling of grape-juice, the sapid particles get too intimately mingled 
with the bulk of the liquid to be detected so fully by the taste; but 
by being kept, and kept quiet, they are again liberated, and impinge 
more perceptibly upon the nerves of the palate. Mr Wright's old 
passover wine is, therefore, sensibly better than the new. Moreover, 
the flavors and aromas of wines, which determine their price, are not 
in any ratio to their fermentation or their alcohol. 

3. It is said, "The new skin-bottles of the ancients allowed the 
elastic gases of the fermenting liquid to expand them, and therefore 
they did not burst and spill the wine." 

This is a delusion, for the strongest hide of hog or ox, formed into 
a bottle and filled with grape-juice that had begun to ferment, would, 
if closed up, be burst asunder as with imprisoned steam ; and if not 
closed, then the old bottle would run no risk of rending.* A cubic 
inch of sugar, transformed into carbonic acid gas, occupies a space of 
probably forty times as much. 

4. " There is but one kind of wine, because ' wine ' is defined in the 
dictionaries as the fermented juice of the grape." 

This is not true of the oldest dictionaries, and the modern ones 
cannot settle the usage of words in ancient times — but only induction 
from the literature of antiquity, f A modern lexicon may define wine 
as ' the fermented juice of the grape/ but what said the greatest of the 
logicians of the thirteenth century — Thomas Aquinas? Discoursing 
(the original can be seen in Migne's Patrologice, 4th book, 74th sec. 
5th art.) of the proper substance to be used in the eucharist, he says, 
"Grape-juice (mustum) has the specific quality of wine" — speciem 
vini. The objector falls into the fallacy of excluding the 'mare' from 
the genus 'horse'; for, though fermented-juice is 'wine,' it is so not 
to the exclusion of the first form of wine — namely, the unfermented 
juice. That the 'Angelical Doctor' was right, usage will show: — 
Hippocrates (b.c. 400), in his work on diet, says, — 
" Glukus is less fitted to make the head heavy . . than other wine (oinodeos)." 

Athenaeus, the Grammarian (a.d. 280), in his 'Banquet' (lib. i. 
s- 54) — 

* " The force of fermenting wine is very great, being able, if closely stopped up, 
to burst through the strongest cask." — (Chambers's Cyclopedia, art. ' Wine,' 1750.) 
"The way to preserve new wine in the state of must is to put it up in very strong 
but small casks, firmly closed on all sides, by which means it will be kept from 
fermenting. But if it should happen to fall into fermentation, the only way to stop 
it is by the fume of sulphur." — (Miller, Gardener's Dictionary, art. 'Wine,' 1748.) 
See further, Works of Dr Lees, ii. p. 158, and elsewhere. 

t See translations from the ancient and classic authors, Greek and Roman, 
p. 434. Also various portions of this Commentary, showing the application of 
words for 'wine' in Hebrew, Chaldee, Syriac, Greek, Latin, etc., to 'grapes,' 
'grape-juice,' 'boiled grape-juice,' etc. 



xl PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

"The Mitylenseans have a sweet wine {glukun oinon), what they call prodromos, 
and others call it protropos." 

And again (ii. 24), he says to the dyspeptic tippler, — 

" Let him take sweet wine, either mixed with water or warmed, especially that 
kind called protropos, the sweet Lesbian glukus, as being good for the stomach ; 
for sweet wine (oinos) does not make the head heavy." 

Dioscorides (a.d. 90), in his 'Materia Medica,' expressly ranks the 
Roman sapa, 'boiled wine' — Hebrew, sovai or sobai — under the 
'genus vini.' 

Suidas, Lexiconist (950), defines sweet wine thus:— - 

"Gleukos — to apostalagma tees staphulees prin pateesthee — ' the droppings from 
the grapes before being trodden.' " 

Dr Avenarius, Hebrew Lexiconist (1588), defines — 

"Ahsis, mustum, recently expressed and sweet. German sus : sussurWEiN." 

Lord Bacon, in his 'Natural History' (1597), says, — 

"As wines which at first pressing run gently, yield a more pleasant taste, . . . 

so observations which flow from Scripture gently expressed and naturally expounded 

are most wholesome and sweet." 

Parkinson (1640), in the 'Theatrum Botanicum/ says, — 

"The juyce or liquor pressed out- of the ripe grapes, is called VINUM, wine. — 
Of it is made both SAPA and DEFRUTUM, in English Cute, that is to say boiled 
wine, and both made of mustum, NEW wine ; the latter boyled to the halfe, the 
former to the third part." 

Lyttleton, in his 'Latine Dictionary' (Lond. 1678), says, — 

" Mustum, sc. Vinum. Hebrew, matz, expressit. Muston, vinum cadis 

recens inclusum. Gleukos, oinos neos, 'new wine.' Angl. ' Stum, i. e. NEW WINE 

close shut up, and not suffered to work." 

W. Robertson, M.A., Cambridge (1693), in ' Phraselogia Generalis,' — 
"Wine; Vinum, merum. — New Wine, Mustum. — New Wine that runs out 

without pressing ; Mustum lixivium. — Wine prest, Vinum tortivum. — Wine yet 

on the tree ; Vinum pendens." 

The Glossarium of Carolo du Fresne (Tomus sextus, Paris, 1736), — 

"Vinum Coctum. Gallic, vin cuit. Vinum de pura gutta. Gall., Demere- 

goutte [mother-drop], Vinum protropum est vinum sponte defluens, ante-quam 

uva calcatur. Mtistum, Vinum pede pressum. Quod pede tantum calcatur, 

medium inter vinum sponte defluens," etc. 

J. M. Gesner, the critic, in index to ' Scriptores Rei Rusticse veteres 
Latini' (1730), says, — 

"Once for all it must be observed, that the words vinum, vitis, uva, and 
vinea, as kindred terms, are sometimes used synonymously. The juice of apples, 
pears, pomegranates [as in Cant. viii. 2], and sorbs, was called vinum." [Alfieri, 
in his Dizionario (Venice, 1751), shows that this use is still preserved in part in 
Italian, as it also is in German : — " Vino, a liquor well known, extracted from the 
fruit of the vine. Vinoso, juicy, full of wine. Uva vinosa, grapes full of wine. 
Mosto, vin nuovo, must."] 

E. Chambers, F.R.S., in his 'Cyclopaedia' (6th Ed. 1750), has the 
following, a mere translation from an older French Dictionary : — 

"Wine, in France, is distinguished into — Mere-goutte, 'mother-drop'; which 
is 'the Virgin-wine,' — which runs of itself out of a tap in the vat. Must, sur- 
must, or stum ; which is the WINE or liquor in the vat, after the grapes have been 
trod. Pressed Wine, 'vin de pressurage,' is that squeezed with a press out of the 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xli 

grapes. Sweet Wine, * VIN doux, ' is that which has not yet fermented. Natural 
WINE is such as comes from the grape, without mixture. Burnt Wine is that 
boiled up with sugar. There is also a sort of Malmsey Wine, made by boiling of 
Muscadine. " 

Dr Lueneman, in his ' Worterbuch ' (Leipzig, 1780), has — 

tl Mustum i. n. der Most junge Wein [new wine]. Vinea, ein Weinberg, 
WEiNgarten. — Vinolentus, voll Wein "[full of wine. Bottger's Worterbuch has 
— " Junger Wein, new wine. WEiN-jteltem, to press grapes. Wein-beere, 
grape (wine-berry). WEiN-beer-saft (wine-berry juice). WEiN-ernte, vine-har- 
vest. WEiN-traube, grape-cluster."] 

The 'London Encyclopaedia,' published in 1829, says, — 

" Rhenish must is of two kinds. That made without boiling is only put up so 
close that it cannot work; this is called stum wine'''' — stum being evidently a con- 
traction from mustum, like 'his from omnibus. 

Dr Webster, the American, in his great 'Dictionary' (1828), has — 

i( Must, new wine — wine pressed/; om the grape, but not fermented." [In this 
definition he is only following Johnson, and others still older. B. Blount, in his 
' Glossographia ' (1670), has "New wine, that first pressed out of the grape." 
E. Phillips, in his ' World of Words ' (1671), has "Wine newly pressed from the 
grape."] 

Dr Ure, F.R.S., the chemist, in ' Dictionary of Arts' (1836), says, — 

"Juice, when newly expressed, and before it has begun to ferment, is called must, 
and in common language, sweet wine." 

F. E. J. Valpy, M.A., in 'Etymological Dictionary' (1838), has — 

" Mustus, new, fresh, young. Hence Mustum, i. e. vinum, fresh wine — as 
Merum for Merum Vinum." 

Baron Liebig, in ' Letters on Chemistry ' (2nd series, 1844), wrote, — 

" If a flask be filled with grape-juice and made air-tight, and then kept for a few 
hours in boiling water, . . . THE WINE does not ferment " (p. 198). 
"The fermentation of wine and of beer-wort are not isolated phenomena." 
" The wine is left to ferment. One of the wiNE-growers of the Duchy," etc. 

The Popular Cyclopedia (1846), which is a translation from the 
t German Conversation Lexicon,' has the following : — 

"Must, the juice of the grape. In wine countries this unfermented sweet must 
is distinguished from the sour must, or unripe wine of a year old. It can be kept 
in close vessels after the mucilage has been precipitated" — [or settled on its lees]. 

"Wine. — There is only one species of wine \fprotropos~\ made without beating, 
treading, or pressing; this is what they call in Spain lagrima [tears]. The grapes, 
melting with ripeness, are suspended in bunches, and the wine is the produce of 
the droppings. The juice of the grape, when newly expressed, and before it has 
begun to ferment, is called must, and, in common language, sussur wein [sweet 
wine]. It is turbid, has an agreeable and very saccharine taste." 

Dr W. Freund, in his ' Worterbuch der Lateinischen Sprache ' 
(Leipzig, 1845), has— 

"Vmdemia [vino-demo, 'to draw wine from']; I. Vintage; II. Transf. (a) 
Grapes, wine ; (b) pi. vintage-season; (c) harvest of similar things, as oil-olive, 
honey, etc. 

"Vinum, digammated from oinos, wine. Transf. {a) grapes ; (b) fruit-wine. 

" Mustum, new or unfermented wine." 

5. " Some classical scholars — whose scientific education, however, 
has been neglected — have objected that " the juice of the grape con- 

/ 



xlii PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

tains alcohol by nature, and even grapes have been known to intoxi- 
cate ; and so the whole theory of the abstainer gives way." 

It is altogether erroneous to suppose that grapes, or grape-juice 
freshly expressed, have any taint of alcohol. Many years ago a careful 
chemist, at our solicitation, went through a very elaborate examina- 
tion of the whole matter, and demonstrated that alcohol forms no 
part of grapes. The experiments were published in the public 
papers, and a reward of ^50 offered by the British Temperance 
League " to any person who will extract any appreciable quantity of 
alcohol from grapes, ripe or rotten, provided the fruit has not been 
in any way meddled with by art." The intervention of man is always 
necessary to the placing of fruit in a condition to permit of the vinous 
fermentation. In the cases where bears, hogs, or men are inebriated 
with grapes, it is the result of gorging, whereby they turn their 
stomachs into a brewing vat ; the fruit fermenting instead of digest- 
ing, and vapors, probably alcohol also, may be generated, which 
affect the head.* 

During 1867 some clergymen in Ulster were prematurely rejoicing 
over the reputed discovery of 'a trace of alcohol' in the passover 
wine prepared by Mr Wright, using the supposed fact as a glad 
reason for returning to the adulterated port which contains a maxi- 
mum of spirit and only a trace of ' the fruit of the vine ' ! That 
chemist, however, at once proceeded to Belfast, and in the presence 
of the public experimentally demonstrated that his wine was not 
proved to contain even ' a trace.' Professor Hodges, and Dr H. 
Brown, who made the rash assertion, had deceived themselves. They 
had asswned that the chromic acid test would reveal the presence of no 
other substance besides alcohol in the wine, whereas the fruit aroi?ias 
give the same reaction. Dr Hodges, who is a respectable chemist, 
admitted that an enormous quantity of the wine must be used in 
order to find an exhibitable quantity of alcohol! This passage in 
the history of controversy illustrates the justice of what Liebig 
observes, that " from the moment the imagination is allowed to solve 
questions left undecided by researches, investigation ceases — truth 
remains unascertained ; and there is not only this negative evil, but 
in error we create a monster, envious, malignant, and obstinate — 
which, when at length trutn endeavors to make its way, crosses its 
path, combats, and strives to annihilate it." In this case, happily, 
the friends of light were stronger than the devotees of darkness, and 
the appeal to common sense was more successful than that to 
authority. 

That alcohol is not a product of growth — i. e. of those natural pro- 
cesses that perpetuate the forms of ' created things ' — is a fact that at 
once negatives the preceding objection. Even some imperfectly 
informed abstainers have been too easy in their acceptance of pseudo- 
scientific dogmas. Here is one specimen : — 

* See Dr Lees' 'History of Alcohol,' 1846, and 'Text-Book of Temperance,' for 
detail of experiments. 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xliii 

6. " The new products which result from fermentation are attributa- 
ble rather to the life than the death principle." 

Now grape-sugar and albumen are plainly products resulting from 
the life of the vine. But by decomposition, which only ensues when 
these substances are parted from the vital organism, the albumen 
becomes yeast, and thereafter the alimentary sugar is resolved into 
the poison alcohol and carbonic acid. What ///^-principle produces 
this ? ' The power of the living God ! ' True, but that power is as 
much present in death as in resurrection; in decay as in growth; in 
decomposing as in composing; in simple as in complex combinations; 
and what is common to ' creation ' and ' destruction ' cannot destroy 
the difference between them, which the objection attempts to do. 
Unfortunately, we have to deal with a school of complacent critics 
who have so much got the habit of teaching as to have forgotten that 
of learning, who will argue about sciences they do not understand; 
and it is almost impossible to excite in them a suspicion that they 
may be wrong. Otherwise, we might have hope in reproducing such 
language as the following from Professor Liebig: — 

"It is contrary to all sober rules of research to regard the vital process of an 
animal or a plant as the cause of fermentation. The opinion that they take any 
share in the morbid process must be rejected as an hypothesis destitute of all support. 
In all fungi, analysis has detected the presence of sugar, which, during their vital 
process, is not resolved into alcohol and carbonic acid ; but after their death, from 
the moment a change in their color and consistence is perceived, the vinous 
fermentation sets in. It is the very reverse of the vital process to which this effect 
must be ascribed. 

" Fermentation, Putrefaction, and Decay. These are processes of 
^composition, and their ultimate results are to reconvert the elements of organic 
bodies into that state in which they exist before they participate in the process of 
Life, [whereby] complex organic atoms of the highest order are reduced into 
combinations of a lower order, into that state of combination of elements from 
which they sprang" {Letters on Chemistry, 2d series, 1845). 

It is from this point of view that we are enabled to perceive the 
symbolical fitness of the Biblical prohibitions of ferment, and its de- 
generated products, in all such ceremonies and sacrifices as typified 
Life, Purity, and Regeneration. 

It has been very beautifully observed by Professor Fraser, of 
Edinburgh, that — 

"The Divine Ideas expressed in the laws of Nature are, through our physical 
discoveries, becoming, in the form of similar ideas in ourselves, a part of the 
experience of man. Every scientific discovery puts us more in sympathy with the 
Divine meaning. The antagonism of Faith and Science disappears, as each 
deepening insight into natural law is felt to bring our thoughts into nearer harmony 
to those Divine thoughts of which our otherwise strange surroundings in this world 
of sense are found to be the expression." 

A little reflection would show that on a point of daily morals so 
important as temperance and the use of inebriating beverages, one 
which in so many forms crosses the path and confounds the purposes 
of the Sacred Oracles, it is hardly credible that the most advanced 
examples of inspired wisdom, in lawgivers, prophets, and apostles, 
should antagonize alike the partial truth of the contemporary philo- 
sophy of paganism, the experience of successive ages, and the con- 



Xliv PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

elusions of modern Science forced upon the reluctant judgment of its 
disobedient priesthood. Yet the fact is undeniable, that, in spite of 
the opposition of the interested, the venality of the press, and the 
despotism of fashion, Providence has, during the last thirty years, 
compelled Science to lay her successive offerings upon the altar of 
Temperance. 

We can here only attempt an Epitome of the Evidence furnished 
by Observation, Statistics, and Science, but it shall be an historical 
consensus — drops, as it were, from 'a cloud of witnesses,' — in the 
language of divines and dramatists, physicians and philosophers : — 

"Wine deceiveth him that drinketh it." — The Vulgate, Hab. ii. 5. 

"How exceeding strong is wine! it causeth all men to err that drink it." — 
I Esdras iii. 18. 

"Water makes those who drink nothing else very ingenious, but wine obscures 
and clouds the mind." — Eubulus, B.C. 375. 

" I admire those who desire no other beverage than water, avoiding wine as they 
do fire. Hence arise irregular desires and licentious conduct. The circulation is 
hastened. The body inflames the soul." — Clement of Alexandria, a.d. 180. 

" O thou invisible Spirit of Wine, if thou hast no other name to be known by, 
I will call thee — Devil." — Shakespeare. 

" The fumes of the Wine left him nothing of his more refined nature. All that 
was honorable or intellectual in his character had now completely ceded to all 
that was base and animal." — Wilkie Collins, * Antonina, 185 1. 

"Alcohol is a disturber of the system, and cannot be regarded as a food. . . . 
Alcohol neither warms nor sustains the body. Alcohol should be prescribed medi- 
cinally as carefully as any other poisonous agent." — Dr Edward Smith, i860. 

"The influence of alcohol upon the nervous system, and particularly upon the 
brain, is manifest by a progressive and constant series of symptoms, which, in 
different degrees of intensity, are reproduced in all individuals. These constitute 
a true poisoning; and this morbid state is exhibited under three phases : — (1) sur- 
excitation; (2) perturbation; (3) abolition of the cerebro-spinal functions." — Dr 
Michael Levy, on 'Hygiene,' Paris, 1857. 

"Facts establish, from a physiological point of view, a line of demarcation 
between alcohol and foods. Alcohol is not a food. It acts in a feeble dose as 
an irritant; in a larger as a stupefiant." — Professors Lallemand and Perrin, 
Paris, i860. 

" Alcohol does not act as food ; it does not nourish tissues. It cuts short the 
life of rapidly-growing cells, or causes them to live more slowly. The stunting 
which follows its exhibition to young animals is readily accounted for." — Lionel 
S. Beale, M.D., F.R.S., of King's College Hospital, 1863. 

"Experience and statistics, amongst operatives, soldiers, and middle-class 
civilians, in England, America, Germany, and India, establish the truth that, under 
the same circumstances, the percentage of sickness and mortality is twice as great 
amongst moderate drinkers as abstainers, and four times as great among drink- 
hards." — Dr Lees. 

"Alcohol is a mere drug ; and although a constituent, is not the valuable one in 
wine." — Robert Druitt, M.D., Report on Wine, 1866. 

"Finally, there are a number of substances, of which we are not able to prove 
that they are either used for the repair of the tissues, or transformed in the body 
so as to generate heat; in this class we place alcohol, chloroform, the aethers, 
various alkaloids, strychnia, morphia, and the vegetables which contain them." — 
F. E. Anstie, M.D., 1864.* 

[For other testimonies see Note to Matt. iv. 7.] 

* This author inconsistently contends, however, that alcohol is food, because it 
arrests waste ! He begs his definition, which we entirely repudiate. Food is that 
which, first, acts innocently upon the body, and, secondly, acts usefully by making 
blood. Alcohol does neither. Scientific men should scorn mere tricks of defini- 
tion, and adhere to facts. 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xlv 

Now it seems to us, that so far from having, in any one particular, 
contradicted these truths, the Bible has most singularly confirmed, 
and, in words at least, anticipated them. 

History says — "All nations who drank intoxicating wine, in all 
conditions of climate and culture, have erred through its use, and 
gone out of the way." 

Scripture responds — " Israel, God's chosen nation — her priests, 
her teachers, her princes and kings, drank wine in bowls, and 
were swallowed up of wine, wherefore they were sent into cap- 
tivity." 
Experience says — "The common and social use of intoxicants, 
alcoholic or otherwise, has a physical tendency to create an intem- 
perate appetite, insatiate as the grave, making slaves of thousands." 

Scripture answers — "Wine deceiveth a lofty man, and en- 
largeth his desire as hell (Hab. ii. 5) ; it bringeth poverty and 
pain, sorrow and remorse upon him, yet he crieth, '/ will seek it 
yet again'''''' (Pro v. xxiii. 35). 
Morality teaches — " Wine is dangerous — it slowly but surely en- 
snares and enslaves the Will. Terrible is the power of this tricksy 
spirit to allure; it causeth all men, of whatever rank, to err." 

Scripture re-echoes — " Wine is a mocker (latz) ; Wine is a de- 
frauder (bogad). Woe to him that giveth his neighbor drink!" 
(Hab. ii. 15). 
Virtue exclaims — "Wine stimulates the sensual nature, and nar- 
cotizes the moral and spiritual : whence arise irregular desires." 

Scripture replies — " Look not upon it, lest thine eyes look 
upon strange women, and thine heart go after perverse things." 
Experiment proves that " alcohol is a disturber of the brain, and 
decreases consciousness and the perception of light, and ' casts dark- 
ness over the soul ' " (Eubulus). 

Scripture correspondingly commands — that " God's priests, while 

doing His work, shall drink no strong drink, lest they die"; — and 

it further declares, that " while the drinking Jews rebelled and 

corrupted their ways, His Nazarites remained pure as snow." 

Physiology announces — that " the maximum strength of man can 

only be realized by abstinence from alcoholic wine, which cuts short 

the life of growing cells, and stunts the growth of young animals." 

Scripture records — that " when the strongest man was to be 

reared, an angel from heaven imposed the practice of abstinence 

upon both mother and child." 

Science declares — that " intoxicating wine is not food; that alcohol 

is a mere drug; that it should be prescribed as carefully as any other 

poisonous agent; that, as & poison, it ranks with strychnine, opium, and 

tobacco." 

And Scripture finally anticipates all this, for, in text after text, 
such wine is not only described as acting like the poison ' of the 
serpent and the basilisk,' but actually called a poison (Deut. xxxii. 
33; Hos. vii. 5; Hab. ii. 15). 



xlvi PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

When Christians are half as anxious to harmonize Bible teaching 
with Temperance truth, as with geology or astronomy, they will find 
ready to their hands a much ampler and far simpler apparatus of 
conciliation. One final illustration must suffice. According to 
Augustine, the Manicheans held that intoocicating wine (for they 
used grapes) was Fel principiis tenebrarum — ' the gall of the Prince of 
Darkness.' Now the Bible clearly speaks of a wine that is ' the 
poison of dragons,' and describes with the very signs of fermentation, 
a wine that ' biteth like a serpent.' Thus the idea of wine being a 
poison is not a mere modern notion. It can be shown, however, that 
it is the express and literal language of Inspiration ; nay, more, that on 
the supposition that it was the Divine purpose to teach us that wine 
is poisonous by means of the Scripture, God has done so in the only 
possible way, i. e. by the use of the proper Hebrew word for ' poison.' 
If any one chooses to argue that the word has other possible mean- 
ings, less true and applicable to the case, we can only protest against 
eliminating the true and most fitting sense of the passage, and thus mak- 
ing the Bible into a ' nose of wax.' 

In the A. Version there are only two words translated poison, and 
one of these is so translated but once ; in the margin ' a poisonful 
herb.' The texts prove that this word (rosh) really signifies some 
special herb of a bitter nature, like hyssop, hemlock, or the poppy. 
The other word is khamah, — the Hebrew term for 'poison' in 
general, connoting that inflaming property common to so many intoxi- 
cants.* In the A. V., the word is actually translated ' poison ' in six 
out of the eight instances in which it occurs as the name of a physical 
substance or property : — 

Deut. xxxii. 24. The poison of serpents of the dust. 

Deut. xxxii. $$• Their wine is the poison of dragons. 

Psalm lviii. 4. Their poison is like the poison of a serpent. 

Psalm cxl. 3. Adder's poison is under their lips. 

Job vi. 4. The poison drinketh up my spirit. 

It may be objected that the skin bottle Hagar carried with her is 
called khameth, and that this is the same word. Even granting that 
(of which there is no proof), no example occurs of the use of khameth 
for 'bottle,' from the time of Moses to that of the minor prophets. 
It was, then, quite obsolete in the days of the latter — had been so, 
apparently, for eight centuries, — and, moreover, there were four other 
words for ' bottle,' and four or five for cup, in regular use by the later 
Hebrews. To depart from the current and continuous meaning of 
khamah, as 'poison,' and identify it with a long obsolete word for 
kidskin 'bottle,' is a simple whim.f Even then the idea returns, since 

* There is another word (root, mar, ) signifying in one passage ' gall-bladder ' or 
venom, but not ' poison ' in our broad sense. 

t Dr McCaul, Professor of Hebrew in King's College, in his ' Examination of 
Bishop Colenso's Difficulties,' has the following concerning the Hebrew khamu- 
shim, to which the assailant of the Pentateuch, taking a leaf out of the book of 
the assailants of Abstinence, persisted in assigning the exclusive meaning of 



PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. xlvii 

' the bottle ' could only mean, like i the cup of the Lord's right hand,' 
a vessel containing some destructive potion. 

But khamah had a ' figurative ' use as well, and is the word so often 
translated fury, anger, wrath, displeasure. As ' poison ' is that which 
disturbs or destroys the body, so God's cup of wrath is that mental 
poison which destroys the soul. Professor Nordheimer, in his ' Critical 
Grammar,' translates hay-yayin hak-kha?nah as the 'maddening wine' 
(Jer. xxv. 15), because it is that punishment which makes mad. 
" They shall drink, and be moved, and be mad." As yayin harekakh 
(spiced wine) in Canticles literally means ' wine which (is) spice,' so 
yayin hakhamah literally is ' wine which (is) poison.' 

We now direct attention to two plain texts where Tyndale seems to 
have been thoughtlessly and implicitly followed, and so the word 
'bottle,' under the unconscious influence of prejudice, displaced the 
word for its poisonous contents. He who had so correctly translated 
the word as 'poison' before, could not do so here, simply because he 
could not believe in the sense it gave. We who know how literally 
true that sense is, why should we seek to obscure or ignore it ? 

Hosea, vii. 5 : " The princes made him sick with khamah (poison) 
of wine." 

Habakkuk, ii. 15, 16: "Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor 
drink, that puttest thy khamah (poison) to him! The cup of the 
Lord's right hand shall be turned unto thee." 

Lexicons and commentators cannot make this matter plainer than 
does the context. Even our translators, in putting 'bottle,' say in the 
margin, as did Tyndale, l heat through wine.' St Jerome's version 
has fel, 'poison,' 'gall.' Montanus has venenum tuum, 'thy poison.' 
Drusius cites others; so does Rabbi Jonah in Ben Melech. The 
learned Dr John Gill says, "The word is by some translated 'thy 
gall,' 'thy poison,' which fitly enough expresses the poisonous doc- 
trines which men sensibly imbibe." Professor Pick translates, 'pouring 
out his wrath. 1 It is plain, beyond denial, that the prophets were not 
speaking of wine-vessels at all (much less of princes handing skin- 
vessels to the king), but of the causal-quality of the liquor drank. It 
was the khamah which sickened and maddened; and the declaration 
is, that God will pour His cup (elsewhere called khamah, fury) upon 
the man that giveth his neighbor khamah to drink. If that drink 
were not poisonous, where would be the foundation for the figure ? 
The lexicons cannot deny the facts. Parkhurst defines khamah as 
'an inflammatory poison'; Archbishop Newcome has 'gall, poison.' 
The Arabic still retains the word in several forms, as khumat, shumum, 
khemah, for 'poison,' 'fever] etc. So we reach the old conclusion, 
that whenever we are willing to credit the Biblical teaching, we shall find 

'armed': — "The meaning 'armed' is not only doubtful, it is improbable; first, 
because it does not suit the context of Exod. xiii. 18. Its suiting the three other 
places where the word occurs cannot outweigh the fact that it does not suit here. 
The testimony of the ancient versions is of no value, as the word does not occur 
at all after the Book of Judges, and had therefore become obsolete long before the 
time of the earliest of them, the Lxx. Their translation is a mere conjecture." 



xlviii PRELIMINARY DISSERTATION. 

an exact accordance between Biblical language and physical truth. 
If men are not willing, they will go on evading, quibbling, controvert- 
ing, to the end, wresting the Bible to their own destruction, and con- 
verting a volume which is the Directory of moral purity and life, 
into an instrument of sensual depravity, social deception, and moral 
death. 

In Lessing's beautiful book, 'On the Education of the Human 
Race,' after comparing the Jewish Bible to a primer, he refers to the 
captivity under Cyrus, when the Jews were first made conscious of 
the full meaning of their own Scriptures, and, through the influence 
of courtly fashion, first effectually taught sobriety : — 

" Revelation had guided their reason, and now, all at once, reason 
gave clearness to their revelation. The child, sent abroad, saw other 
children who knew more — who lived more becomingly, — and asked 
itself, in confusion, ' Why do / not know and do that too ? Ought I 
not to have been taught and admonished of all this in my father's 
house?' Thereupon the child again sought its primer, which had 
long been thrown into a dark corner, in order to throw off the blame 
upon the primer. But, behold ! it discovers that the blame does not 
rest upon the book: that the shame is solely its own, for not having 
long ago known this very thing, and lived in this very way." 

So the Christian Church has been sent abroad into the realms of 
science, and it has there been taught a practical lesson of physiology 
and dietetics, which it would never adopt on mere principles of self- 
denial. Thereupon, partly in wonder, partly in doubt, and partly in 
opposition, it has begun to consult its primer, to confirm, to question, 
or to confute the truth of Science. We trust and hope, that when the 
investigation is completed, the shame will be confessed to be its own, 
for not having long ago known this very thing, and lived in this very 
way. F. R. L. 



THE BOOK S 



OF THE 



OLD TESTAMENT. 



Great pains were taken in the Preliminary Dissertation to state what we regard as the true relation 
of the Bible to the use of alcoholic drink, to anticipate mistakes of the issue, and to expose false 
principles and facts of interpretation. It seems, however, to be in vain, for one London paper (T/ie 
Athenceum) has, in its notice of the first edition of this book, grossly misrepresented the object of it 
as being to prove that Bible wines were mainly unfermented ! — and a second paper ( The Echo) has, 
in reference to the notes on Gen. i. 29, published a criticism which shows that the writer had not 
even read the second page of the Commentary ! He says : — " Of course this ingenious argument 
depends upon the assumption that the benefits derived from the alcohol do not compensate the loss 
of the sugar— this is the whole point in dispute, and must be settled upon other than scriptural 
grounds." Yes, of course, and therefore the exposition proceeds to 'Cos. facts which relate to the prin- 
ciple. When an apostle says, ' Do good as you have opportunity ' — it is reason applied to facts that 
must show wherein the good consists — in other words, how to fulfill the law. When the Saviour 
says, ' Love your neighbor,' it is not the bare text that shows who is our neighbor; and hence the 
very need of the exposition and of the parable. The Echo argues that because scripture-law and 
words do not explain themselves, but want a commentary, therefore none should be given ! As the 
law which says, ' Thou shalt do no murder,' is to be interpreted by the judge who determines its 
meaning : so the law which says for what purpose God gave fruit and grain to man, must be inter- 
preted by the rational critic, and any system which the facts in evidence show to be inconsistent with 
that purpose, or with the welfare of mankind, must be condemned. 



THE BOOK OF GENESIS. 



Chapter I. Verse 29. 

And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, 
which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is 
the fruit of a tree yielding seed ; to you it shall be for meat. 



Every herb] Hebrew, kal asev. Asev, as full-grown herbage (including grain 
of all kinds), is distinguished from desheh, young and tender grass, and from 
khatzir, ripe grass, fit for mowing. The Lxx. renders asev by chorion, green 
plants of every species ; but Aquila has chloee, young green corn or grass. The 
Vulgate reads herbam. 

Every tree] Hebrew, kol hah-atz, i. e. every plant of woody fibre, in distinc- 
tion from flexible sprouting plants. So the Lxx. pan xidon, every kind of wood 
or timber ; and the V. universa ligna, all sorts of wood-growth. 

To you it shall be for meat] Lahkem yihyeh Uahkelah, "to you it shall be 
for eating "=that which is to be eaten. With this agrees the Targum of Onkelos, 
— le-maikal. The Lxx., Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, all read eis brosin, 
— for eating. The V. has in escam, — for food. 



This Divine saying is a Charter at once concise and all-comprehensive. What- 
ever produce of the earth is fit for food, it places at man's disposal. From dust 
was the human body formed, and out of the dust comes its sustenance. He who 
fashioned and animated the one, freely bestows the other. The animals that are 
eaten derive from the vegetable world all that renders their flesh nutritious. Men 
are not bound to eat everything that grows, but they can eat and assimilate nothing 
which has not first grown up under the power of the Highest. 

In regard to the food so bountifully provided, man's duty comprehends- I, 
Thankfulness to his Divine Benefactor, which involves devotion ; 2, Co-operation 
with the laws of Providence for the increase of this food, which involves industry ; 
3, Appropriation of this food to the end designed, the health and vigor of man, 
which involves frugality and temperance. All waste of food is condemnable ; and 
waste occurs when more food is consumed than can be made use of in the body : — 
hence the glutton abuses both his body and the material fitted to nourish it. Waste 
equally accrues when food is deprived of any of its nutritious properties ; still more 
palpably, when food becomes transformed into any substance charged with evil to 
mankind. Such waste is always and inevitably connected with the vinous fermenta- 
tion which converts grape-sugar into alcohol and carbonic acid. Sugar, the good 
creature of God, and a real food, is destroyed, and, by new chemical affinities, its 
elements are broken up, and fresh substances formed, of which it cannot be truly 



GENESIS, I. 29. 



said, " they shall be to you for food." The assertion that alcohol is in sugar, or in 
any unfermented saccharine substance, can only be made in utter ignorance of the 
alphabet of chemical science.* This waste of food has become all the greater 
since — in order to produce intoxicating liquors in larger quantities than the fermented 
juice of grapes could yield — grain, to the extent of about fifty million bushels 
yearly, is employed in the United Kingdom alone for brewing and distillation. 
By the malting process the starch of corn is converted into sugar, and this again 
by fermentation into alcohol and carbonic acid. Distillation draws off the alcohol thus 
formed, and the spirit so educed (not produced), being mixed with less water, more 
readily exerts its specific effects. The solid food thus wasted would supply a fair 
amount of aliment to some millions of persons every day all the year round. The 
plea that the alcoholic fermentation is ' a natural process ' cannot avail in extenuation 
of this waste, since it is no more natural than those other processes of decay against 
which food is assiduously guarded, nor would alcoholic liquors come ' naturally ' 
into existence at all, were they not designedly manufactured by man himself. 
" God made man upright ; but he found out many inventions." As the sole end 
sought by this waste of food is the production of an alcoholic beverage, it devolves 
upon those who sanction the transformation to show that some compensating advan- 
tage is thereby secured. (1) That alcohol is itself a food is an hypothesis desti- 
tute of all scientific support ; for being destitute of nitrogen, it cannot make blood or 
help to repair bodily waste. The theory at one time generally received, that its com- 
bustion produces animal heat, is now abandoned as being proofless, while a series 
of careful experiments by distinguished men of science in France and England have 
furnished evidence that alcohol is in course of ejection, unchanged, thirty hours 
after being swallowed. (2) Another theory, that alcohol serves as an equivalent 
for food by diminishing the metamorphosis of tissue, is without weight, for experi- 
ments have not justified the theory; and were it otherwise, the use of alcohol to 
diminish the normal waste of tissue would be open to censure, as a mischievous 
interference with one of the vital processes on which the renewal of corporeal strength 
depends. (3) Could it be shown that alcohol, when imbibed, is neutral as to 
any sensible effect, its manufacture at the expense of the staff of life would be a vast 
economic crime ; but the probability is that its operation on the healthy organism 
is always in some degree deleterious, the measure of injury varying with the 
quantity, strength, and frequency of the amount imbibed. In all works on toxi- 
cology alcohol is classed among narcotico-acrid poisons, and like other poisons, 
its action when not fatal, is yet demonstrably pernicious. Some of its evil 
effects, though apparently trivial or even insensible at the moment — as, for 
example, in impairing the redness of the blood-globules and the structure of the 
blood-vessels — assume a serious importance when regarded as cumulative during a 
succession of years. (4) No dispute, indeed, can arise on the point that, as ordi- 
narily consumed (for its exciting property), alcohol occasions a large amount of 
disease and premature death, apart altogether from the sin and misery of intoxica- 
tion. (5) Along with these physical consequences due account should be taken of 
its influence on the moral, social, and religious life of the countries where it is com- 

* The old chemical formula of sugar is oxygen 3, hydrogen 3, carbon 3 ; the new is oxygen 3, 
hydrogen 6, carbon 3 ; but in the decomposition of sugar these elements recombine so as to generate 
alcohol and carbonic acid ; thus : — 

O H C O H C 

01 , ( Alcohol ... 132 N { Alcohol ... 162 

uia 1 Carbonic acid 2 o 1 1N ew ( Carbonic add . 201 



3 3 3 363 

Not only is the sugar of grain and fruit thus destroyed, but their albumen becomes converted into 
yeast, and thus ceases to be food. 



GENESIS, II. 1 6, 17. 5 

monly consumed; and were this done, the stupendous folly of converting a nation's 
food into such an insinuating article would not fail to be recognized, deplored, and 
denounced by the Christian world. (6) The assertion that man has a natural pre- 
disposition or instinct for intoxicating articles, because he has always and everywhere 
been known to use them, is untrue from first to last, (a) The reason is not a 
correct statement of the facts, since many tribes have been discovered who were 
ignorant of all intoxicants, and others have made systematic regulations for their 
exclusion, (d) Any argument in favor of intoxicating drinks from their prevalent 
use would be equally available in favor of war, slavery, drunkenness itself, and 
vice of every description, (c) Natural instinct, so called, might be depraved in- 
stinct, the transmitted result of parental transgression of natural law. (d) But, in 
reality, natural instinct (save where the drunkard's appetite runs in the blood) is 
universally repugnant to the use of alcohol until it becomes perverted by persistent 
consumption of alcoholic compounds. (7) The final conclusion is, that the manu- 
facture and use of alcoholic beverages are opposed to the Divine charter which 
assigns the produce of the earth to man for food. By the destruction of the sac- 
charine and albuminous constituents of fruit and grain, ignorant or ungrateful man 
virtually declares, "To me they shall not be for meat," thus seeking to nullify and 
reverse the benevolent designs of his heavenly Father. 



Chapter II. Verses 16, 17. 
16 And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of 
the garden thou may est freely eat : 17 But of the tree of the knowledge 
of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou 
eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. 



It has been contended that the Divine procedure, in creating the tree of the 
knowledge of good and evil, and permitting access to it by our first parents, is 
reason for allowing the use of intoxicating liquors and the traffic in them as 
beverages. Virtue, it is argued, is strengthened by exposure to temptation and 
resistance of it. But the danger of such reasoning is apparent on reflection, for, 
under the pretense of proving virtue and piety, and invigorating them by the 
opposition evoked, the darkest spirits of evil may claim to be recognized as 
angels of light and benefactors of our race. In like manner, the progress of 
holiness, both in the individual and in humanity, may be exibited as a misfortune, 
because diminishing the number and intensity of these trials of fidelity ! What we 
are sure of as regards the Divine economy, in the Edenic as in every after age, is, 
that God has never put His creatures to any proof involving an inducement to evil 
doing, and that He has never needlessly exposed them to moral danger. "He 
cannot be tempted of evil, neither tempteth He any man;" but "His tender 
mercies are over all His works." Whatever is to be understood by the tree of 
knowledge, and whatever construction, literal or allegorical, is put upon the 
Mosaic narrative, we know that some external tests of men's spiritual obedience 
were unavoidable, and that in the period of his innocence these tests did not 
address themselves to any depraved proclivity or bias. To infer from thence that 
men may now tempt themselves by using articles that originate a diseased appetite, 
and that they may tempt others by engaging in a traffic in such articles, is surely a 
lamentable wresting of the Divine Word. Temptation is unavoidable under the 
present constitution of society, and when resisted, is, by Divine grace, converted 
into a means of holiness ; but so far from therefore encouraging temptation, and 



GENESIS, III. 6. 



occasions of it, we are taught to pray, "Lead us not into temptation;" and we are 
warned that though ' offenses ' — causes of stumbling — must needs come, through 
human wickedness, woe is it to the man by whom they purposely come; and we 
are solemnly warned against putting an occasion of falling in a brother's way. 
Even were there any reality in the analogy suggested, it would only lead to this 
conclusion — that strong drink may be manufactured and houses for its sale set up, 
but that all indulgence and traffic in it must be prohibited — the virtue of men being 
put to the proof in resisting the temptation to use and traffic in the prohibited 
liquor. Would those who descant on the value of temptation care to have drink 
and drinking-houses exhibited while all connection with them was put under moral 
and legal ban? Yet this is the only analogy to be gathered from this passage; the 
tree of knowledge of good and evil was, indeed, planted and placed within reach, 
but the command given was not to eat of it, and the recompense of disobedience 
was death! 



Chapter III. Verse 6. 



And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and 
that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make 
one wise, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto 



her husband with her, and he did eat. 



This verse sententiously describes the 'great transgression'; voluntarily com- 
mitted, indeed, but occasioned, in no small measure, by the circumstances 
preceding it. Eve was standing on dangerous ground, near to the forbidden tree, 
which she should have avoided; she was found in dangerous company, that of 
the subtle serpent, which she should have shunned; and she was engaged in 
dangerous excercises which she should have disallowed, lending an ear to 
deceptive counsel, and fixing an eye on a seductive substance. Is it strange that, so 
situated and employed, she should have fallen? Would that her progeny had 
taken warning from her want of true wisdom ! * How impressive the lesson — 
that, whenever possible, both the sphere and occasions of evil, as well as its actual 
operations, ought to be dreaded and excluded ! Those who see no sin in using a 
little drink, or in occasional visits to the tavern, argue as Eve might have done 
the moment before "she took of the fruit, and did eat." Though Adam's appa- 
rently ready compliance with Eve's invitation to share the unhallowed feast is a 
mystery, it is certain that he was powerfully influenced by affection for his spouse ; 
and thus his act becomes an example of the influence for good or evil, which 
women exercise on the other sex, and through them on the destiny of the world. 
When that influence is directed against the fashionable and fatal dietetic use of 
intoxicating drinks, it will bless mankind beyond measure. 

Much ingenious but useless speculation has been wasted on curious questions 
arising out of this text; such as the period which elapsed between Adam's creation 
and Eve's formation, and between their conjugal union and their common sin; the 

*The leading journal of Britain has said, that if our Temperance doctrines are correct, " Paradise 
was wrongly constructed" ; but a calm review of the case will demonstrate the contrary. Eve fell, 
not because evil was prohibited, but because she willfully tampered with duty, and courted tempta- 
tion. The fall was the result of the wickedness of the Tempter, and the weak self-confidence of the 
Tempted, teaching that we should not desire to be 'led into temptation,' much less place ourselves 
tvithin its charmed circle. 

" Circumstance, that unspiritual God 
And miscreator, makes and helps along 

Our coming evils with a crutch-like rod." — Childe Harold, Canto iv. 



GENESIS, III. 6. 



nature of the serpent that acted the tempter's part; and the character of the tree 

and the fruit "whose mortal taste brought death into the world, and all our woe."* 

An opinion has even been hazarded that alcohol was the forbidden fruit, by which 

is perhaps meant that its juice was of an alcoholic quality. This is of course a 

mere conjecture, and the assumption that alcohol existed ready formed in Eden, 

and not elsewhere, is wholly gratuitous. No doubt it is possible to trace a 

resemblance between the fascination ascribed to the fruit of this tree, and that 

which is produced by intoxicating drink ; for to those who have become accustomed 

to it, the latter is 'pleasant to the eyes,' and excites sensuous desire; tending, 

when drunk, to create in its admirers a conceit of superior wisdom, that ends in 

folly and sows the seeds of bitter disappointment. Ancient tradition has attributed 

to the eating of the forbidden fruit effects analogous to those of inebriating liquor ; 

an idea which Milton, in his regal poem, has brought out with consummate skill. 

He represents that Eve, on tasting 'those fair apples,' became the subject of an 

unnatural appetite and exhilaration : — 

" Greedily she engorged without restraint 
And knew not eating death ; satiate at length, 
And heighten'd as with wine, jocund and boon." 

She thus describes her feelings to Adam : — 

" Opener mine eyes, 
Dim erst, dilated spirits, ampler heart, 
And growing up to godhead." 

So she felt, yet the great poet exposes the delusion by an expressive touch : — 

" But in her cheek distemper flushing glowed. 

Adam, however, yields, and when the hapless pair sin together, — 

" As with new wine intoxicated both, 
They swim in mirth, and fancy that they feel 
Divinity within them, breeding wings 
Wherewith to scorn the earth ; but that false fruit 
Far other operation first displayed, 
Carnal desire inflaming." — Paradise Lost, ix. 

In this poetical description no probability is violated by the supposition that the 
effect of the forbidden fruit was to stimulate the sensual tendencies and undutiful 
ambition attending the outward act of transgression. Then came the revulsion 
and shame related by the sacred historian (Gen. iii. 7). 

The conception that an intoxicating influence proceeded from the 'alluring 
fruit' doubtless strengthened the belief that a continuance of man's original 
innocence would have been accompanied by abstinence from all liquors capable of 
producing such ' distemper ' of body and mind. That Milton entertained this 
opinion is plain from his picture of the entertainment provided by Eve for 
Raphael, when — 

"Fruit of all kinds, in coat 

Rough or smooth rind, or bearded husk, or shell, 

She gathers tribute large, and on the board 

Heaps with unsparing hand ; for drink the grape 

She crushes, inoffensive must, and meaths 

From many a berry, and from sweet kernels press'd 

She tempers dulcet creams." 

It may be objected that the use of flesh-meat was as little sanctioned by primitive 
man as the use of intoxicating liquors. But there is a radical distinction between 
the cases. Animal food is composed of the same elements as other food; while 
alcoholic liquors are distinguished from other beverages by qualities believed by 
many to make them very valuable and desirable, if not necessary to human health 

* The vulgar opinion that the fatal fruit was a species of apple originated in the twofold use o^ 
the Latin pomttm and malum, as signifying round fruit in general, and the apple-fruit in particular. 
The apple being the best known of English orchard fruits, has gained a questionable distinction 
which it is likely to retain for long. 



8 GENESIS, VI. 5, 



and longevity. Were this estimate correct, their use would have been specially 
appropriate in the times of man's innocence; and the moral danger now associated 
with their consumption would then have been reduced to its lowest point. 



Chapter VI. Verse 5. 
And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, 
and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil 
continually. 



The causes of this intense depravity of the antediluvians have been learnedly 

discussed by legions of theologians, but the silence of Scripture offers ground for 

nothing better than ingenious guesses. Whether it was associated with, and 

promoted by, the use of inebriating drinks, is also a branch of the same inquiry 

on which conjecture can cast but the faintest glimmer. If the fruits of the earth 

were only eaten for food, or their juice drunk immediately after being expressed, 

the terrible secret of vinous fermentation may have been reserved for a later age. 

This happy ignorance — or the sagacious prudence which refused to apply the 

discovery — may have prevailed among the 'sons of God,' in their integrity and 

simplicity of heart. In his 'World before the Flood,' James Montgomery 

represents the wife of Enoch " 'midst fruits and flowers," as engaged — 

" Plucking the purple clusters from the vine 
To crown the cup of unfermented wine." — Canto 3. 

As to the self-reprobated sinners on whom God's mercy waited in vain, it is scarcely 
credible that they should have remained ignorant of the fermenting process, or that 
if acquainted with it, they should have denied themselves so agreeable a medium of 
adding a new zest to every vice, and depraving depravity itself. That they were 
' eating and drinking ' in a state of lawless revelry when the judgment of God 
overtook them appears to be indicated by the Saviour's words (Luke xvii. 27) ; and 
it is difficult to imagine that the ' insolence ' with which they were ' flushed ' had 
not, like that of Sodom, wine to inflame it. If, on the other hand, it is thought 
more likely that that awful wickedness was not aggravated by the intoxicating bowl, 
this view of the depths of evil to which human nature can sink without the aid 
of alcohol, is an unanswerable reason why such an artificial and potent agent of 
demoralization should be utterly discarded from the Church and the world. 



Chapter IX. Verses 20 — 27. 
20 And Noah began to be an husbandman, and he planted a vine- 
yard : 21 And he drank of the wine, and was drunken ; and he was 
uncovered within his tent. 22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the 
nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without. 23 And 
Shem and Japheth took a garment, and laid it upon both their 
shoulders, and went backward, and covered the nakedness of their 
father ; and their faces were backward, and they saw not their father's 
nakedness. 24 And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his 
younger son had done unto him. 25 And he said, Cursed be Canaan ; 
a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. 26 And he said, 
Blessed be the Lord God of Shem ; and Canaan shall be his servant. 
27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of 
Shem ; and Canaan shall be his servant. 



GENESIS, IX. 20 — 27. 



V. 20. Husbandman] Literally, ' a man of the earth ' (or ' red-soil'— adahmah. ) 
The Lxx. has georgos gees — 'a cultivator of the earth.' The V. agricola, 'field- 
cultivator. ' 

A vineyard] Kerem, a Hebrew term signifying a cultivated piece of land set 
with fruit-trees. One of the principal of these was the vine, and hence kerem 
became generally applied to a vineyard — tilled land devoted chiefly but not 
exclusively to the culture of the vine. Noah's kerem probably included all kinds 
of fruit-bearing plants. Some of the Rabbins held that though the vine had been 
cultivated before, Noah was the first to conduct the cultivation methodically, and 
to set the vines together as a vineyard. The Lxx. has kai ephuteusen ampelona, and 
the Vulgate et plantavit vineam, both meaning 'and he planted a vineyard.' The 
Targum of Jonathan enlarges the Scripture narrative with a curious legend — 
"And Noah began to be a cultivator of the earth, and he lighted upon a vine 
which the flood had carried away out of the Garden of Eden, and he planted it in a 
vineyard, and in that very day it blossomed, and its grapes ripened, which he 
pressed out; and he drank from the wine, and was drunk." 

V. 21. And he drank of the wine, and was drunken] Hebrew, vay- 
yasht min hay-yayin vay-yiskkar, "And he drank from the yayin" (wine) — i. e. 
some of it — "and was filled (with it)." The Targum of Onkelos reads ushthai 
min khamrah urvi, "and he drank from the khamrah (wine), and was drunk" 
(or drenched). The Lxx. has kai epien ek tou oinou, kai emethusthee, "and he 
drank from the wine, and was drunk" (or surcharged). The Vulgate, Bibensque 
vinum inebriatus est, "and drinking the wine he was inebriated" (or saturated).* 

[On yayin, the generic term rendered 'Wine' in the A. V., see Prel. Dis.] 

It can hardly be doubted that a name was given by the ancient Hebrews to the 
expressed juice of grapes, and if that name was not yayin, what was it? But 
that they should have selected a name having reference to the occult fermenting 
process is an hypothesis highly improbable, for such a specific discrimination would 
have peremptorily interdicted the application of the name to the juice of 'grapes in 
an zmfermented state, whereas that it was so applied is absolutely certain. Let 
the generic meaning be sought for in the juice yielded by manual or mechanical 
pressure, and there will be no difficulty in accounting for the contimced application 
of the name to the grape-juice under any change to which it was spontaneously 
exposed, or artificially subjected. It has been gravely alleged that Yayin must 
always be taken to signify inebriating grape-juice, because such is its signification 
the first time it occurs, viz., in this verse — a conclusion as ridiculous as would be 
the statement that the Hebrew words ruakh, elohim, shahmaim, and eretz, invaria- 
bly express, in all parts of Scripture, the meanings they respectively bear in the 
first verse of the first chapter of Genesis — viz., 'spirit,' 'the True God,' 'the 
visible firmament,' and 'the terraqueous earth.' It is notorious, on the contrary, 
that other and very different uses of all these words are common in subsequent 
parts of the Old Testament. Generic terms, as is well known, are sometimes 
variously employed to convey opposite ideas ; as from barak, 'to kneel,' come the 
derivative meanings of ' to bless ' and ' to curse.' If it be asked how we know that 
the yayin used by Noah was intoxicating, we reply, Not so much by the ambiguous 



*" Ebrius, literally one who has drunk his fill; drunk, intoxicated; in general, abundantly filled. 
Etymology dubious, usually derived from e and b, root of bibo, ' I drink.' Inebrio, to make drunk, 
inebriate; to saturate, fill full." — Dr Smith's Latin-Eng. Diet. Pliny, in treating of the vine, 
remarks (xiv. 3), Conduntur et musto uvce, ifisceque vino suo inebriantur, " Grapes are preserved also 
in must, and are themselves inebriated (soaked) in their own wine." 



10 GENESIS, IX. 20 — 2J '. 

word translated 'was drunken,' as by the condition into which the wine cast him. 
Where the context does not decide the special use of a generic term, the broad sense 
must be retained. 

Vay-yishkar, 'and was drunken,'' answers to the old English sense of the word 
'filled with drink' — not necessarily with , intoxicating drink. Shah-kar (whence 
comes yishkar) is rendered by Gesenius, 'to drink to the full,' with an implied 
reference to the saccharine quality of the liquid drunk. 

V. 24. And Noah awoke from his wine] Hebrew, vay-yiqetz Noakh miy- 
yayno, ' And Noah awoke from his wine ' — leaving it, as it were, behind him. 

[ Yah-qatz signifies to wake or rouse up. ] With this agree the Hebrew-Samaritan 
text, the Samaritan Version, and the Tar gum of Onkelos. The Lxx. is expressive 
— exeneepse de Noe apo tou oinou, "And Noah became sober from the wine" 
\exeneepse comes from ek in the sense of ' entirely, ' and neephein ' not to drink ' — 
meaning he became perfectly sober] — and figuratively 'recovered his senses,' 
'came to himself — a sense which the Arabic version preserves — "But when Noah 
had recovered himself from his drunkenness." 



Noah drinking copiously of grape-juice which had become fermented and intoxi- 
cating (of which some have supposed he was not aware), himself became intoxicated, 
and, as it would seem, so suddenly as to fall down uncovered in his tent; in that 
condition he is found by his son Ham, perhaps also by his grandson Canaan, who 
show their want of decency and filial piety by at once informing Shem and Japheth ; 
jf, indeed, we may not understand that they related the fact with mockery or glee. 
The latter at once proceed, with delicate alacrity, to cover their father's shame, and 
when the patriarch recovers his consciousness he knows — by a peculiar intuition — 
what has transpired, and is supernaturally prompted to pronounce a curse on 
Canaan, and a blessing on Shem and Japheth. It has been supposed that the 
Yayin may have been purposely drugged by Ham or Canaan, but the form of the 
narrative gives no countenance to such an aggravation of his son and grandson's 
guilt. It is not probable that such an incident, if real, would have been unknown 
to Moses, or left unrecorded if known. Whether this was Noah's first and only 
act of intoxication is a question that may be reasonably answered in the affirmative : 
how it should have been committed at all is a question to which a plausible answer 
is more difficult. Can we suppose that he had lived for 600 years ignorant of the 
vine? or that he had never before expressed its juice?* or that he had never pre- 
viously allowed it to ferment before drinking it? Can we suppose him ignorant to 
this time of the nature and use of fermented wine? or was he induced by some 
passing circumstance (of heat or thirst) to take a draft unusually large? On the 
whole it may be inferred, from the absence of Divine reproof, that his intoxication 
was neither intentional, nor the result of gratifying a morbid love of intoxicating 
liquor. 

Observation I. It is noticeable that the first time intoxicating liquor is named in 
Holy Writ it is associated with intemperance — a presage of the same connection 
from that period to the present. Caustically, but with saddest truth, does Butler, 
the author of 'Hudibras,' say of this 'pleasant poison,' — 

*Dr Pye Smith conjectures that the Vine, after the deluge, may have been finer and fuller of juice 
than before, and that this circumstance suggested the idea of expressing its juice, which would become 
intoxicating without the knowledge of the fact at first. The narrative, indeed, gives no intimation 
of surprise at the effect produced, which would surely have been felt had it been a novel state : but, 
on the other hand, it may be said that the burden of the reproof seems to rest upon the fact of reveal- 
: ng the nakedness of the Patriarch, which his son might attribute to another cause than the one 
assigned by the narrator. 



GENESIS, XIV. 15, 1 8. II 

"Which since has overwhelmed and drowned 
Far greater numbers on dry ground 
Of wretched mankind, one by one, 
Than e'er the flood before had done." 

2. A good man was the first victim of this alcoholic spell. If he was not 
cognizant of it, or was too confident of his ability to resist it, the warning is 
equally clear and strong. Whether the danger of using intoxicating drink is 
unsuspected or despised, it is imminent and real — even to the pious. The only 
recorded sin of the Antediluvian preacher of righteousness was the sin of one act 
of intoxication ; but who shall reckon up the number of such sins, and of the sins to 
which this vice has led, which have befallen the noblest and purest natures by an 
addition to intoxicants ? Abstinence alone is safe, and good for all. 

3. The tendency of intemperance to entail, directly or indirectly, family misery 
and misfortune, is illustrated by the curse brought upon Canaan. Those who take 
pleasure in the intemperance of others, or delight in deriding it, are fitting themselves 
for a wretched future. By its immediate effects, and reflex associations, strong drink 
is a source of immeasurable woe. Fabricius relates as a Jewish legend, that when 
Noah planted the vine he killed a sheep, a lion, an ape, and a sow, and having 
mingled their blood, poured it upon the roots of the plant, so that the use of wine 
(not, however, the fresh, but the fermented blood of the grape) has since been 
attended, in succession, by the placidity of the sheep, the boldness of the lion, the 
nonsensical noisiness of the ape, and the filthy brutishness of the sow. The legend 
carries its moral on its face, but is only half the truth, since the domestic and social 
influences of inebriating drink yet remain to be symbolized. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 15. 
And he divided himself against them, he and his servants, by night, 
and smote them, and pursued them unto Hobah, which is on the left 
hand of Damascus. 

That Abraham, with a comparatively small array, should have defeated and 
scattered the hosts of the four confederate Assyrian kings, is not very surprising, 
even apart from the special aid of the Most High; their imaginary security laid them 
open to a successful night assault ; and Josephus, who perhaps followed some local 
tradition, adds that while some were asleep in bed, others machesthai de apo methee 
on dunatoi, "were not able to fight on account of drunkenness. " Amongst the spoils 
may have been some of the 'wine of Sodom,' by which the victors were themselves 
overcome. Secular history supplies parallel instances of similar indulgences and 
similar results. 

Chapter XIV. Verse 18. 
And Melchizedek king of Salem brought forth bread and wine : 
and he was the priest of the most high God. 



The Hebrew reads lekhem vah-yayin — ' bread and yayin ' ; with which agree the 
Hebrew- Samaritan Text and Samaritan version. Onkelos has lekhem va-khamer, 
1 bread and khanier? The Lxx., artous kai oinon, ' loaves and wine.' The Vulgate, 
panem etvinum, 'bread and wine.' A question may arise, whether the yayin of 
this passage is not to be understood in the sense of grapes rather than their expressed 
juice [as in Jer. xl. 10 — " Gather ye yayin and summer fruits "] — seeing that bread 
and grapes continue to be associated in the East as articles of daily food. If the 



12 GENESIS, XIX. 3, 30 — 35. 

common acceptation of grape-juice is preferred, the juice may have been recently 
expressed. That it was fermented and intoxicating is a groundless conjecture. 
Even the knowledge that it was so would not demand or justify the common use 
of alcoholic liquors in the present day. Dr Kitto on this passage observes, that 
"in the language of Scripture, 'bread and wine,' as the chief articles of meat 
and drink, represent all kinds of food." Kalisch remarks, "He brought out to 
Abraham bread and wine, not to refresh him or his men — for Abraham had, among 
the booty of his enemies, seized their large stores of provisions also, — but to perform 
a symbolical ceremony in which bread and wine have a typical meaning." 



Chapter XIX. Verse 3. 
And he made them a feast, and did bake unleavened bread, and 
they did eat. 

A feast] Hebrew, mishteh ; Lxx., poton ; Vulgate, convwium. Mishtehis 
derived from shah-thah, ' to drink. ' In hot climates cool and acid fluids form a 
desirable and important element in all social entertainments. The name would 
thence be naturally applied to all the provision on such occasions. The English 
Version properly renders it by 'feast' aud 'banquet.' 

Unleavened bread] Hebrew Matzolh, the plural of matzah, which is generally 
derived from matzatz, ' to suck,' ' to be sweet ' — hence matzoth, ' sweet things ' — i. e. 
loaves or cakes not fermented ; similar, no doubt, to the ' cakes ' {ugoth — circles of 
kneaded dough) made ready by Abraham for the angels (Gen. xviii. 6). Dr A. 
Clarke assigns to matzatz the secondary meaning of ' to compress ' — matzoth being 
the name given to cakes made of dough compressed — heavy, or ' sad. ' Matzoth is 
contrasted with fermented matter {khahmatz) in Exod. xii. 15, 19, 20, 34, 39, etc. 
In the fermentation of dough, its saccharine property is reduced, because partially 
changed into alcohol, which is afterward expelled by the heat of baking. The 
notion that there is ' spirit in bread ' is, therefore, a vulgar error. The Lxx. gives 
azumous, and the Vulgate aztima, 'unleavened things.' 



Chapter XIX. Verses 30 — 35. 
30 And Lot went up out of Zoar, and dwelt in the mountain, and his 
two daughters with him; for he feared to dwell in Zoar; and he 
dwelt in a cave, he and his two daughters. 31 And the firstborn said 
unto the younger, Our father is old, and there is not a man in the 
earth to come in unto us after the manner of all the earth : 32 Come, let 
us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may 
preserve seed of our father. 33 And they made their father drink wine 
that night : and the firstborn went in, and lay with her father ; and 
he perceived not when she lay down, nor when she arose. 34 And it 
came to pass on the morrow, that the firstborn said unto the younger, 
Behold, I lay yesternight with my father: let us make him drink 
wine this night also ; and go thou in, and lie with him, that we may 
preserve seed of our father. 35 And they made their father drink wine 
that night also : and the younger arose, and lay with him ; and he 
perceived not when she lay down, nor when she arose. 



Nashqeh (twice), rendered 'let us make drink,' does not imply any compulsion, 
but simply 'let us give to drink.' Yayin occurs four times in this passage, 



GENESIS, XIX. 30 — 35. 13 

and in each case is translated 'wine.' Onkelos puts khamrah as the equivalent. 
The Lxx. reads— potisomen ton patera heemori oinon, "Let us cause our father to 
drink wine." The Vulgate is stronger — inebriemus eum vino, "Let us inebriate 
him with wine." 

That this yayin was suffered to become intoxicating by fermentation is exceed- 
ingly probable, though some explain its potency by the supposition that, whether 
fermented or not, it had been mixed with powerful drugs. In the fourth book 
of the 'Odyssey,' Helen is described as casting into the wine {oinon) prepared for 
Telemachus, a drug {pkarmakon) said to be "grief-assuaging, anger-allaying, and 
causing oblivion of all ills " (neepenthes facholon te kakon epileethon apanton). In 
the tenth book, Homer tells of the use made by Circe of 'direful drugs ' (pharmaka 
lugra). Milton turns this legend to a noble allegorical account in his 'Comus,' 
where the son of Bacchus and Circe is depicted, and his 

" Baneful cup 
With many murmurs mixed, whose pleasing poison 
The visage quite transforms of him that drinks." 

That Circean arts were known and practised in Sodom is highly probable, and 
that Lot's daughters became acquainted with the method of preparing the 'en- 
chanted' potion is very likely. It is certainly hard to understand how, under 
such solemn circumstances as those from which the righteous patriarch had just fled, 
he should so suddenly, and, as it were, with his eyes open, have sunk into such 
debasement. The Orientals, at the present day, have a knowledge of drugs, which 
they use for similarly profligate purposes. The objection that Lot's daughters could 
not have procured the drugs in their seclusion is of no force, for the wine may have 
been brought from Sodom; and if not, the ingenuity which obtained the yayin 
would be equal to its adulteration for their impure purpose. The words of Moses 
(Deut. xxxii. 32, 33) — "Their vine is of the vine of Sodom, . . . their wine is 
the poison of dragons," naturally construed, implies that the wine of Sodom had a 
traditional reputation for the qualities which drugs are known to impart. The 
silence of Scripture is not a strong objection; for the narratives of the Bible 
generally leave much to be inferred. What is positively affirmed is, that the juice 
of the grape was used; and that it had became corrupted and corrupting in some 
way, whether by fermentation or drugging, or both, is made certain by the effects. 

Observation 1. It may be inferred that Lot was not accustomed to drink wine, 
or his daughters would not have plotted to entrap him into the partaking of it. 
These deviations from his habitual abstinence were the cause of grievous sin to the 
patriarch, who had kept himself pure in Sodom. 

Where an article inherently dangerous is concerned, separation from it is the 
only security even for the best of men ; and when perfect safety can be found, why 
should good men reject it? 

2. The tendency of intoxicants to inflame sensual propensities is graphically 
pointed out in this transaction. Lot's daughters knew the quality of the instrument 
they employed. The insensibility induced did not deprive the alcoholic wine of 
its lustful influence (Prov. xxiii. 33). The excitement of the animal passions is 
the first effect of all alcoholic liquors; hence they may be said to carry within 
them the germs of all the excess to which they give rise. If the daughters of Lot 
drank of the wine they pressed upon their father, they would do so from their 
acquaintance with its libidinous influence. Female chastity is never more imperiled 
than when plied with strong drink. For this and other reasons the ancient Romans 
enjoined strict abstinence upon their women. Can indulgence, however moderately, 
in such liquors, be an illustration of Christian temperance ? 



14 GENESIS, XXVII. 22, 25, 28, 37. 

3. The evils of drunkenness cannot be too seriously pondered in order to warn 
against any connection with the drink by which it is caused. Excellent Matthew 
Henry says on this passage, "Drunkenness is not only a great sin itself, but the 
inlet of many sins ; it may prove the inlet of the worst and most unnatural sins, 
which may be a perpetual wound and dishonor. A man may do that without 
reluctance, when drunken, which, when sober, he could not think of without 
horror. . . . From the silence of Scripture concerning Lot, henceforward we 
may learn that drunkenness, as it makes men forgetful, so it makes them forgotten, 
and many a name, which otherwise might have been remembered with respect, is 
buried by it in contempt and oblivion." 



Chapter XIX. Verses 14, 15, 19. 
14 And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and took bread, 
and a bottle of water, and gave it unto Hagar, putting it on her 
shoulder, and the child, and sent her away : and she departed and 
wandered in the wilderness of Beer-sheba. 15 And the water was 
spent in the bottle, and she cast the child under one of the shrubs. 
. . . . 19 And God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of 
water; and she went, and filled the bottle with water, and gave the 
lad drink. 



It is clear that Abraham was attached to Hagar, and did not consent to dismiss 
her except under a conviction that her safety and the boy's would be secured. 
He provided for their principal and more urgent wants by furnishing them with 
"bread and a bottle of water" — in the Hebrew, lekhem vekhamath maim. Bread 
was to be their solid, water their liquid, sustenance. In most Western countries 
water is so abundant that the value placed upon it in the East seems exaggerated; 
but a visit to Eastern lands would show that no estimate of this value can be too 
great, and that in water is to be found the true elixir vitce after which there has 
been so much ingenious and useless search. The Oriental mind is scarcely capable 
of the shameless ingratitude too common among us, and from which many pro- 
fessing Christians are not free — of despising the only fluid which is essential to 
animal existence and comfort. 



Chapter XXI. Verse 25. 

And Abraham reproved Abimelech because of a well of water, 
which Abimelech's servants had violently taken away. 



To a sheik or pastoral chief like Abraham, the possession of a 'well' was 
exceedingly precious ; and both the value of this property, and his natural resent- 
ment at the injustice committed, would dispose Abraham to remonstrate with a 
prince even so powerful as Abimelech, against the violent usurpation of which 
his servants were guilty. 

Chapter XXVII. Verses 22, 25, 28, 37. 
22 And Jacob went near unto Isaac his father; and he felt him, 
and said, The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of 



GENESIS, XXVII. 22, 25, 28, 37. 1 5 

Esau 25 And he said, Bring it near to me, and I will 

eat of my son's venison, that my soul may bless thee. And he 
brought it near to him, and he did eat : and he brought him wine, 

and he drank 28 Therefore God give thee of the dew 

of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine. 
. . . . 37 And Isaac answered and said unto Esau, Behold, . 
with corn and wine have I sustained him. 



V. 25. He brought him wine, and he drank] The Hebrew is yayin, 
the Targumists give khamrah, the Lxx. oinon, and the V. vimim. Whether the 
yayin was fermented or not is not said ; nor, however prepared, would the inci- 
dent form a rule of conduct to us. The Targum of Jonathan introduces into this 
part of the narrative a legend which shows that the Chaldee khaniar was appli- 
cable to ' grape-juice ' in the unfermented state. The passage runs thus : — " Neither 
had he (Jacob) wine with him, but an angel had prepared and brought to him some 
of the wine which had been in its grapes from the beginning of the world ; and he 
gave it into Jacob's hand, and Jacob carried it to his father, who drank it." Of 
such wine {yayin or khamar) none need scruple to partake, even if some other than 
an angel were the purveyor. 

V. 28. Corn and wine] The ' dew of heaven ' included all kinds of moisture 
necessary to the ' fatness of the earth ' ; and this ' fatness ' is partially defined by the 
concluding clause, " and (or even) plenty of corn and wine." The Hebrew is dahgan 
ve-tirosh — not corn made up into bread nor vine-fruit made into wine — but the 
actual growth of the field. [On Tirosh, see Prel. Dis.] It is sufficient to remark 
that the association here, and in many other passages, of tirosh with corn, as a pro- 
duct of the soil, proves it to have been a solid substance, and not a liquid. Nor is 
this conclusion invalidated in the least by the fact that the Targumists translate it 
by khamar ; that the Lxx. version \% pleethos sitoic kai oinou, 'fullness of corn and 
wine ' ; that the V. has abnndantiam frumenti et vini, ' abundance of corn and 
wine ' ; and that other versions treat it as the liquid produce of the vine. After pas- 
sages will show, however, that the Lxx., Vulgate, and other versions give render- 
ings of tirosh that favor our argument, while the case of the Targumists simply 
proves that, for some reason unknown, they ignored a distinction very clearly drawn 
in the only authority, the Hebrew original. It is to be remarked, indeed, that in 
almost every case where tirosh occurs in the Hebrew and Hebrew-Samaritan 
texts, and where the Targumists render it by khamar, the learned compilers of 
Bishop Walton's Polyglot give mustum (new, unfermented wine) as the equivalent ; 
as likewise do all the Continental versions of the Bible — German, Italian, Spanish, 
French, etc. 

V. 37. With corn and wine have I sustained him] The Hebrew is — 
dahgan ve-tirosh semaktiv — "Corn and Tirosh have I sustained him with." The 
Lxx. has — "with corn and wme I have supported him" — si to kai oino esteerisa 
auton. The V. gives, "with corn and wine I have established him "—frumento et 
vino stabilivi eum. 



Obs. It is God who bestows the 'fatness of the earth,' that man's heart may be 
filled ' with food and gladness ' ; but enlightened piety will ever draw a distinction 
between the Divine gifts and the misuses to which they are put. To conclude that 
the two are identical, or that the first sanctifies the second, is an absurdity too gross 



I 6 GENESIS, XL. 9 — 13, 21. 

to deceive any, when plainly stated; yet the most ordinary form of objection to the 
Temperance Reform is based on this very absurdity ; — as, for example, the inference 
generally advanced, that alcoholic wine and beer are God's good gifts, because the 
fruit and grain employed (and extensively destroyed) in making strong drink are 
Divine gifts ! To honor and rightly use ' the fatness of the earth ' is to consume it 
with as littie alteration for the worse as possible. On the other hand, to convert 
Tirosh into an intoxicating liquid is not to appropriate the fatness of the vine as 
conferred by God, but is to abuse it in a manner that cannot be too soon repented 
of and abandoned. 



Chapter XXXV. Verse 14. 

And Jacob set up a pillar in the place where he talked with him, 
even a pillar of stone; and he poured a drink-offering thereon, and 
he poured oil thereon. 



And he poured a drink-offering thereon] Hebrew, vay-yassak aleihah 
nesck, 'And he poured upon it a pouring ' =that which was poured. What liquid it 
was that was thus poured out is not stated. See Note on Exod. xxix. 40. 



Chapter XL. Verses 9 — 13, 21. 

9 And the chief butler told his dream to Joseph, and said to him, 
In my dream, behold, a vine was before me; 10 And in the vine 
were three branches; and it was as though it budded, and her 
blossoms shot forth; a?id the clusters thereof brought forth ripe 
grapes: nAnd Pharaoh's cup was in my hand: and I took the 
grapes, and pressed them into Pharaoh's cup, and I gave the cup 
into Pharaoh's hand. I2 And Joseph said unto him, This is the 
interpretation of it: The three branches are three days. 13 Yet 
within three days shall Pharaoh lift up thine head, and restore thee 
unto thy place ; and thou shalt deliver Pharaoh's cup into his hand, 
after the former manner when thou wast his butler. ... 21 And 
he [Pharaoh] restored the chief butler unto his butlership again ; and 
he gave the cup into Pharaoh's hand. 



V. 9. The Chief butler] The Hebrew is sar ham-mashqim, 'chief of the 
cup-bearers.' Mashqim is the plural of mashqeh, from shah-qah 'to drink,' the 
Hiphil conjugation of which takes the sense of giving-to-drink, as in the case of 
Lot's daughters ; so that the mashqeh was one who gave drink to another. 

A vine was before me] This is the first place in which the term ' vine ' occurs. 
The Hebrew is gephen, and denotes ' that which is bent — a twig ' ; hence ' a plant 
that has twigs,' and hence 'a vine,' which is its usual signification in the Old 
Testament. The Lxx. has ampclos, the Vulgate vitem. 

V. 10. And it was as though it budded] Bishop Horsley proposes to read, 
"And it was upon the point of putting forth its blossoms." 

And the clusters thereof brought forth ripe grapes] ' Clusters ' 
is the translation of eshkeloth, which originally signified the ' stalks ' of the vine. 
' Ripe grapes ' is the A.V. rendering of anahvim, the plural of anahv, 'a cluster,' and 



GENESIS, XL. 9 — 13, 21. 1 7 

usually 'a cluster of grapes.' The connection between eshkol (a stalk) and anahv 
(a cluster) was thus very close, and not always distinguished; for the eshkol would 
easily come to signify the stalk with the grape-clusters attached. 'Ripe' is an 
addition of our translators, but is partially supported by Kalisch, who takes eskeloth 
to signify 'unripe clusters'; and viewing bah-shal, not as 'to bring forth,' but 'to 
cook' or 'ripen,' he reads the clause thus: — "Its unripe cluster matured into ripe 
grapes." The description is concise and vivid. As the chief cup-bearer slept he 
saw first the bare form of a vine, then the vine with its buds just sprouting, next 
the vine in full flower, and finally the stalks with their berries ripened into purpled 
clusters. 

V. 11. Pharaoh's cup] The Hebrew of 'cup' is kos, supposed to be a contrac- 
tion of hones, 'a receptacle,' from kah-nas, 'to collect.' 



This narrative suggests several interesting questions : — 

I. Was the vine cultivated in Egypt? The text undoubtedly implies that it was, 
and this is explicitly affirmed of the period of the Exodus. On the other hand, a 
passage in Herodotus (book ii., ch. 77) states that the Egyptians "use wine pre- 
pared from barley, because there are no vines in their country" — oino d'ek 
krithedn pepoieemeno diachreeontai, ou gar sphi eisi en tee choree ampeloi. Sir 
G. Wilkinson conjectures that Herodotus may refer only to the corn-growing 
districts, which were not well adapted to the growth of the vine. Whatever may 
be the explanation, and however credible the testimony of Herodotus as to the state 
of things in his own age, his words cannot apply to Egyptian agriculture ten 
centuries preceding his visit. The evidence of Scripture as to the cultivation of 
the vine in Egypt has been corroborated by the paintings on the tombs of Thebes, 
some of which, copied by Sir G. Wilkinson ('Ancient Egyptians,' vol. ii., pp. 141 
— 151), strikingly show that the vine was extensively and scientifically cultivated 
by the ancient Egyptians. Hellanicus even mentions a report that the first culti- 
vators of the vine were the settlers round about Plinthina, an Egyptian city on the 
Mediterranean. The time of vintage in Egypt was toward the end of June or 
commencement of July. In one painting boys are represented guarding the ripened 
clusters from the depredations of birds, and men are depicted plucking the grapes 
and carrying them away in wicker baskets. For wine-making the Egyptians 
sometimes used bags filled with grapes, which were squeezed by the turning of 
two poles in opposite directions. They also built raised platforms where men trod 
the clusters, whose juice flowed into a lower receptacle, and thence into vessels 
ready to receive it. Athenseus, who died a.d. 198, describes, in his 'Deipnoso- 
phistai,' various kinds of Egyptian wine, one of which — the Mareotic — he says, 
' does not affect the head ' — kephalees ouk kathiknoumenos. Of the Tgeniotic, he 
states that "it has such a degree of richness \_liparon; literally, 'fatness'], that 
when mixed with water it seems gradually to be diluted, much in the same way as 
Attic honey well mixed." Of another species he remarks, that it is so thin and 
digestible that "it can be given without harm to those suffering from fever" — os 
tois puretmousi didomenos mee bleptein. The sober would select such wines as 
these, while the dissolute would seek after strongly fermented or drugged wines, 
and failing them, would drink to satiety of the less intoxicating sorts. The wall 
pictures prove that both men and women drank at feasts to intoxication, and some 
of the artists seem to have taken a sarcastic pleasure in holding up the intem- 
perance of their contemporaries to ridicule. At a later period, and possibly in the 
earlier ages also, palm wine and beer were extensively drunk, the native name of 



1 8 GENESIS, XL. 9—13, 21. 

the beer appearing in the Greek writers as zythus, but known also as 'barley 
wine ' — oinos krithinos. Caution, however, is called for in pronouncing upon the 
nature of ancient liquors and the manners of the people. The pictured excesses 
may have been occasional, with long intervals of abstinence ; and concerning the 
articles used, the words of Sir G. Wilkinson are entitled to much weight: — "Con- 
sidering how persistent the custom was among the ancients of altering the qualities 
of wines by drugs and diverse processes, we may readily conceive the possibility 
of the effects ascribed to them, and thus it happened that opposite properties were 
frequently attributed to the same kinds." — (' Anc. Egypt.' ii. pp. 162-3.) 

2. How far is the chief butler's dream to be understood as illustrative of actual 
usage? Josephus's version of the butler's speech is as follows : — "He said . . . 
that by the king's permission he pressed the grapes into a goblet, and having 
strained the sweet-wine, he gave it to the king to drink, and that he received it 
graciously" — elege . . . toutous autos apothlibein eis phialeen hupechontos ton 
basileos, diatheesas te to GLEUKOS dounai to basileipiein, kakainon dexasthai kecharis- 
mends. Josephus here uses gleukos to designate the expressed juice of grapes 
before fermentation could possibly commence. Whether the dream of the chief 
cup-bearer represented his practice at court is doubted. The writer of the article 
'Joseph,' in Smith's 'Dictionary of the Bible' (Ven. Arch. Lord Harvey, M.A.), 
denies that any inference can be drawn from the dream as to the kind of wine 
supplied to the kings of Egypt at this period, and he points out that all the events 
(the growth of the vine, etc.) are described as transpiring with unnatural rapidity; 
but it may be rejoined, that as the events were in themselves natural, the proper 
conclusion is, that it was the custom of the chief cup-bearer to prepare the king's 
wine by pressing the juice of grapes into a receiver, and offering it — not perhaps 
instantly, but after straining it, while it was yet fresh and free from fermentation — 
to the royal hands. That the style of the narration is calculated to convey this 
impression can hardly be denied by any candid mind. Matthew Henry, the prince 
of practical commentators, observes, "Probably it had been usual with them to 
press the full ripe grapes immediately into Pharaoh's cup, the simplicity of that 
age not being acquainted with the modern art of making the wine fine." Bishop 
Lowth (on Isa. v. 2) observes, "See Gen. xl. 11, by which it should seem that 
they (the Egyptians) drank only the fresh juice pressed from the grape, which was 
called oinos ampelinos, — Herodotus, ii. 37." But in the opinion of some critics the 
phrase oinos ampelinos, 'wine of the vineyard,' is used simply to distinguish, not 
one kind of grape-juice from another, but grape wine from palm wine, barley wine 
(beer), etc. Sir G. Wilkinson, however, has obviously an eye to vineyard wine 
freshly made, when he speaks of it as one of the offerings to the gods of Egypt, 
and as "one of the most delicious beverages of a hot climate, and one which is 
commonly used in Spain and other countries at the present day." — ('Anc. Egypt,' 
v. p. 366.) As to palm wine, he remarks, "The modern name of it in Egypt is 
lowbgeh. In flavor it resembles a very new light wine, and may be drunk in great 
quantity when taken from the tree,* but as soon as fermentation has commenced 
its intoxicating qualities have a powerful and speedy effect." — {Ibid., iii. p. 375-) 
Dr Adam Clarke, in his note, is very decided: "From this we find that wine 
anciently was the mere expressed juice of the grape, without fermentation. The 

* This recalls the lines in Thomson's ' Seasons ' (Summer), — 

" Or stretched amid these orchards of the sun, 
Give me to drain the coco's milky bowl, 
And from the palm to draw its freshening wine, 
More bounteous far than all the frantic juice 
That Bacchus pours." 



GENESIS, XL. 9 — 13, 21. 1 9 

saky, or cup-bearer, took the bunch, pressed the juice into the cup, and instantly- 
delivered it into the hands of his master. This was anciently the yayin of the 
Hebrews, the oinos of the Greeks, and the mustum of the ancient Latins." In 
his tract on the Sacrament he says vinum in place of mustum. 

3. Were the ancient kings of Egypt permitted to drink wine? and if so, of 
what sort? Herodotus (B.C. 480), who traveled in Egypt, states that the kings, 
like the priestly class of which they were members, had a portion of wine allotted 
to them — a portion not large enough, indeed, to satisfy them all. To the same 
effect, Hecatseus (B.C. 549) and Diodorus Siculus (B.C. 50) — whose history is in 
the main a compilation from more ancient works — state that king Bocchoris, who 
reigned B.C. 766, enacted "that the kings should take as much wine as would 
refresh but not inebriate." On the contrary, Eudoxus, a learned Greek who had 
visited Egypt, and who died B.C. 340, is cited by Plutarch as affirming, on the 
authority of the priests, that until the reign of Psammetichus (B.C. 640) the kings 
drank no wine. The priests may have meant that the ancient kings were forbidden 
to use wine of an intoxicating quality. Sir Gardner Wilkinson, who enters into this 
question in his 'Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians,' and in his 
Notes to 'Rawlinson's Herodotus,' refers to this narrative in Genesis as evidence 
that "as early as the time of Joseph the Egyptian kings drank wine; " but a per- 
mission to use wine prepared according to the dream might well have co-existed 
with a prohibition to use such sorts as, according to Rosenmuller, contained aliquid 
pestiferum — ' something pestiferous.' 

Dr Kalisch, in his ' Historical and Critical Commentary on the Old Testament,' 
after referring to the conjecture that the chief butler assumes the wine to have 
passed through the fermenting process, significantly adds, " But it is as probable that 
some temperate persons (as it was later ordained in the Koran)* abstained from fer- 
mented wine on account of its more intoxicating power, and that at some period 
the priests, who regulated the king's table as they controlled all his public and 
private affairs, prohibited to him the fermented juice of the grape." The suggestion 
is not without force that the injunction in Prov. xxxi. 4, 5, "It is not for kings to 
drink wine, nor for princes strong drink," was a recognition of 'the wisdom of 
Egypt,' and of the Egyptian kings. The king was the head of the priesthood ; and 
as regards the priests and their temple rites, it seems, from Herodotus, that in his 
day they were allowed " portions of wine, and that wine was offered in the temples, 
and poured upon the altars." The sepulchral paintings confirm the latter statement ; 
but Plutarch, in his ' Treatise on Osiris and Isis ' (sec. 6), furnishes an interesting 
statement, which we quote entire: — "As to wine, they who wait upon the gods in 
the City of the Sun [the ' On ' of Genesis, where Joseph's father-in-law was a 
priest, and the 'Heliopolis' of the Greeks] carry absolutely none into the temple, 
as something not seemly to drink in daytime, the lord and king looking on ; but 
the other priests use wine — a little, indeed — and they have many sacred solemnities 
free from wine {aoinous hagneias), when they spend the time in philosophizing, and 
in acquiring and imparting instruction on divine things. Even the kings themselves, 
being of the order of priests, have their wine given to them according to a certain 
measure as prescribed in the sacred books, as Hecatseus informs us. They began 
to drink (wine) from the time of Psammetichus, previous to which they drank no 

* The law of the Koran was undoubtedly borrowed by Mohammed from a pre-existing and tradi- 
tional morale and regimen. This idea of the possibility of the priests having been more strict at 
one period than another is illustrated by the fact that many of the ancient monastic institutions of 
Britain were founded (as their charters evince) on abstinence principles, from which, age by age, 
they departed, — first through the hospital and medicinal use of wine, until ' good cheer ' and inebri- 
ation became the rule. Hence an argument founded on the assumed uniformity of practice in dif- 
ferent ages must be viewed with suspicion. 



20 GENESIS, XLIII. II. 



wine at all {proteron (fouls epinon oinon); and if they made use of it in their liba- 
tions to the gods, it was not because they looked upon it as in its own nature 
acceptable, but as the blood of those enemies who formerly fought against them, 
which, being mixed with the earth, produced the vine ; and hence they think that 
drinking wine in quantities {to methuein) makes men silly and mad (ekphronas kai 
parapleegous), being filled with the blood of their own ancestors. These things are 
related by Eudoxus in the second book of the Tour, as he had them from the priests 
themselves." The acknowledged fact that the use of wine was strictly forbidden to 
priests during their more solemn purifications, is of no small significance when 
compared with the similar interdict laid on the Jewish priests (Lev. x. 9). 

In the Cambridge Essays (1858) there is a curious paper by Mr C. W. Good- 
win, the Egyptologist, who furnishes translations of some writings of a supposed 
very high antiquity. Several are believed to be as old as the time of Moses, and 
in one of them, Amen-em-an, a steward of the royal house, writes to Pentaour, a 
poet, in the language of reproof. Among other things he says, " If beer (kek — 
which may signify palm wine, Mr Goodwin remarks) gets into a man it overcomes 
the mind. Thou art like an oar started from its place, which is unmanageable 
every way. Thou art like a shrine without its god ; like a house without its pro- 
visions, whose walls are found shaky. If thou wieldest the rod of office (?), men 
run away from thee. Thou knowest that wine is an abomination. Thou hast 
taken an oath (pledge ?) concerning strong drink, that thou wouldst not put it into 
thee. Hast thou forgotten thy resolution? " 



Chapter XLIII. Verse ii. 
And their father Israel said unto them, If it must be so now, do 
this; take of the best fruits in the land in your vessels, and carry 
down the man a present, a little balm, and a little honey, spices, and 
myrrh, nuts, and almonds. 



And a little honey] Hebrew, u-meat devash, 'and a little of honey.' 
The Lxx. reads (v. 10), kai tou melitos, 'and (a gift) of honey.' The V. has et 
mellis, 'and (a little) of honey.' 

It is the opinion of not a few scholars that the Hebrew devash or debash was 
commonly if not exclusively used to represent the luscious substance formed by 
boiling down grape-juice to a jelly-like state. The note of Dr Adam Clarke upon 
this text is as follows : — " Most translate ' honey,' others ' date-juice '; but neither of 
these can be meant, as Egypt abounds in the best honey, and is rich in palm dates. 
The opinion of Shaw [Dr T. Shaw, F.R.S., the eminent traveler] is most proba- 
ble, that the Hebrew debash means a juice of the consistency of honey, prepared 
from dried grapes, and called by the Arabs dibs, the same name. This, in our 
day, is produced only in a tract of land about Hebron, and yearly sent to Egypt to 
the amount of three hundred camel-loads. Ksempfer describes a similar juice. A 
great part of the grapes is reduced by boiling to a syrup, which upon the tables of 
the poor supplies the place of butter, and, with abstemious persons, of wine, being 
mixed with water." Gesenius, in his lexicon, derives debash from a supposed verb 
dabash — Greek depso, 'to work up a mass'; hence debash, "so called as being 
soft like a kneaded mass ; " and having referred to several passages where he con- 
siders 'the honey of bees' is intended, he observes, "(2) Honey of grapes, i. e. 
must or new wine boiled down to a third or half (Greek hepseema ; Latin, sapa, 



GENESIS, XLIX. II, 12. 21 

defrutum ; Italian, musto cottd), which is now commonly carried into Egypt out of 
Palestine, especially out of the district of Hebron (compare Russel's 'Natural His- 
tory of Aleppo,' p. 20) — Gen. xliii. 11 ; Ezek. xxvii. 17." 



Chapter XLIII. Verse 34. 
And they [the brethren] drank and were merry with him [Joseph]. 



The Hebrew runs, vay-yishtu vay-yishkeru immo, "And they drank and were 
well-filled with him." Yishkeru is from shah-kar, 'to drink to the fill,' of shakar, 
'sweet drink,' extracted from the palm, etc. ; though shakar was sometimes used of 
any sweet or pleasant drink, such as the juice of ripe grapes. Where the 'sweet 
drink' had been allowed to stand for a time and become fermented, copious 
draughts would intoxicate; but intoxication cannot logically be inferred unless the 
circumstances (as in the case of Noah) indicate such a condition. The Hebrew 
term rah-vah also signifies 'to drink largely,' 'to be filled with drink,' but it has 
no allusion to the 'sweetness' of the draught. The Samaritan version gives, 'And 
they were heavy.' The Targums have vWavvi, which, like shah-kar, might include 
repletion or inebriation ; and Jonathan, in his Targum, adds by way of excuse or 
explanation, the curious declaration, "Because, from the day in which they were 
separated, they had not drunk wine (khamrah), neither he nor they, until that day." 
The Lxx. reads, "Now they drank and were well-filled with him" — epion de, kai 
emethustheesan mef autou; though methuo, like shah-kar, may be applied to both 
an innocent and an evil drinking. The Vulgate seems to adopt the more damaging 
alternative, 'And they drank and were inebriated with him' — biberuntque et ine- 
briati sunt cum eo, — unless inebriari is employed to express simple 'repletion.' 
The English version, ' were merry, ' is evidently designed to prevent the shock that 
would be given to the devout reader by a statement implicating Joseph in an act of 
excess and intemperance. Professor Stuart, of Andover, considers that what the 
patriarchs drank was "not a fermented liquor, but the simple juice of the grape 
(such as is described Gen. xl. 11) " ; and he adds, "That Joseph and his brethren 
'were merry,' then, was not because they were intoxicated; and even if this were 
the case, as their example is not spoken of with any approbation, we could not 
deduce from it the conclusion that it is commended to our imitation." In truth, 
however, there is no good reason for concluding that such a sin was committed by 
them, or that it was approved and promoted by the pious Joseph. 



Chapter XLIX. Verses ii, 12. 

11 Binding his foal unto the vine, and his ass's colt unto the choice 
vine; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood 
of grapes. 12 His eyes shall be red with wine, and his teeth white 
with milk. 



The Hebrew- Samaritan text reads as follows : — " His citizens being bound to a 
vine, and the sons of his strength to a vine-branch, he washed his vestment in wine, 
and his garment in the blood of grapes. He made him glad as to his eyes from 
wine, and white as to his teeth from milk." With this the Samaritan version 
coincides. The Lxx. Vatican Codex runs, "Binding to a vine his foal, and to the 
helix [or vine-shoot] the foal of his ass, he shall wash in wine his robe, and in the 



22 GENESIS, XLIX. II, 12. 

blood of grapes his garment. Cheering are his eyes above wine, and white are his 
teeth [more] than milk" — Desmeuon pros ampelon tonpdlon autou, kai tee heliki ton 
pdlon tees onou autou, plunei en oinb teen stoleen autou, kai en haimati staphulees 
teen periboleen autou. Charopoioi oi ophthalmoi autou huper oinon, kai leukoi oi 
odontes autou ee gala. 

The Vulgate renders, "Binding to a vine his foal, and to a vine-branch, oh! my 
son, his ass, he shall wash in wine his robe, and in the blood of grapes his cloak. 
More beautiful are his eyes than wine, and whiter are his teeth than milk" — 
Liga?is ad vineam pullum suum, et ad vitem, o fili mi, asinam suam, lavabit in 
vino stolam suam et in sanguine uvce pallium suum. Pulchriores sunt oculi ejus 
vino, et denies ejus lacte candidiores. 

The Syriac gives, "He will bind his colt to a vine, and the foal of his ass to a 
vine-branch. He will cleanse his vestment in wine, and his garment in the blood 
of grapes. His eyes are of a darker red than wine, and whiter are his teeth than 
milk." So in substance read the Arabic and Persian versions. The Targums, 
subsequently quoted, are too periphrastic to be cited here as translations. 

V. II. The choice vine] The Hebrew is la-soraqah — the feminine form 
of soma, 'a shoot' or 'tendril,' or 'a collection of branches,' from soraq, 'to 
interweave.' Bishop Patrick understands a reference to the vine of the valley of 
Sorek, adjoining Eshcol; and Bishop Lowth (Isa. v. 2), regarding 'Sorek' as a 
proper name, proposes to read 'to his own Sorek.' The Sorek vine might pos- 
sibly retain that name when transplanted. One conjecture identifies it with a 
species known in Morocco as the serki, which yields a small but very sweet grape, 
highly prized. In Fuerst's Hebrew and Chaldee Concordance, Soraq is defined to 
be a vine laden with grapes ' filled with a red and superior wine ' — vino, rubro ac 
prcestanti impletis. As to Sorek, comp. Judg. xvi. 4; Isa. v. 2; xvi. 8; Jer. ii. 21. 

He washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of 
grapes] This is a striking example of the parallelism which formed one of the 
features and beauties of Hebrew poetry — the two clauses differing in language but 
corresponding in sense — 'garments' answering to 'clothes,' and 'wine' {yayin) 
to 'the blood of grapes' {dam anahvim). 'Blood' is a poetical name for 'juice,' 
and is evidence of the ancient signification of yayin as 'the juice of the grape,' 
prior to fermentation. This juice, squeezed out, is yayin, and hence the juice in 
the grape, and even the grape itself, might, by a natural figure, bear the same 
name. [Compare Anacreon's poetical reference to oinos as 'confined in fruit upon 
the branches ' — pepedeemenon oporais epi kleematbn (Ode 49), and the description 
of the vintage-treaders 'letting loose the vine' — luontes oino7t.~\ Whether dam 
anahvim (blood of grapes) involves a reference to the color of blood is uncertain. 
If it does, and if soraq yielded a red juice, the allusion to that kind of vine heightens 
the poetical force of the passage. Grapes, purple as well as white, generally yield 
a colorless juice; but the skins of the purple sort dye the juice when trodden in 
the vat; and in this way, if in no other, the similitude would be sustained. [But 
as to 'blood of grapes,' see note on Isa. lxiii. 2, 3.] 

V. 12. His eyes shall be red with wine] This short clause has given rise 
to much diversity of interpretation ; and it will be necessary, for proper considera- 
tion, to divide it into parts : — 

1. 'His eyes shall be red.' The Hebrew is khaklili ainaim, 'red (as to his) 
eyes.' But what is the meaning of khaklili? The Targums use it descriptively of 
the appearance of wine. The Lxx. (Codices A and B) has charopoioi, 'cheering' 
or 'gladdening'; but Origen, in his 'Hexapla,' notices that copies of that version 
were extant in his day (third century) with other meanings, viz., katharoi, 'pure'; 



GENESIS, XLIX. II, 12. 23 

thermoi, ' glowing ' ; diapuroi, * flaming ' ; and phoberoi, ' terrible. ' Aquila's version 
gives katakoroi, 'satiated,' i. e. with color = 'deep-colored.' In the parallel pas- 
sage (Prov. xxiii. 29) the Lxx. rendering of khakliloth is pelidnoi, 'dark blue.' 
Symmachus there reads charopoi, ' gladsome ' ; and Aquila, katharoi, ' pure ' ; unless 
(which is not impossible) the transcriber substituted for an unusual word, such as 
katakori, one which he thought analogous and better understood. The Vulgate 
has pulchriores, 'more beautiful.' Gesenius has an elaborate but undecided note 
upon the word, which he inclines to render 'being dim,' without, however, rejecting 
the idea of something bright and flashing. One scholar finds in it the origin of 
al-cahal, the powder used by Eastern women to darken their eyebrows and deepen 
their beauty, this name of 'alcahal' being supposed to be the same which the 
Arabian alchemists gave to the spirit they distilled from wine, the 'alcohol' of 
modern science. To the same root are traced the Greek achluo, 'to darken,' and 
achlus, 'darkness.' Professor Lee prefers 'refreshed.' Unless some color is 
indicated no parallelism with the 'white' of the next clause is presented; it is also 
clear that the color has some relation to 'wine'; but to determine this relation 
requires an examination of the last two words. 

2. ' With wine ' — Hebrew, miy-yayin. The Hebrew min is a preposition, with 
a very comprehensive range of use. Radically it implies separation, as in the text 
before explained, ' Noah drank of the wine ' — min hay-yayin ; i. e. he drank some 
of the yayin, which, by the act of drinking, was separated from the rest. Thus 
arises the sense of 'out of,' 'from,' and causatively, 'by means of.' This is the 
sense assigned to min in this passage by the English translators, who consider that 
the "eyes of Judah were to be red with wine," i. e. by means of wine. In the 
Targums on this passage, as will be seen below, min is several times employed 
with this signification. On the other hand, min may be used as a term of com- 
parison, in the sense of 'out of,' 'beyond,' 'more than'; and so construed the 
clause would read, "His eyes are red (or bright) above wine," i. e. are of deeper 
color and glow. It is curious to mark that Codex A, Lxx. , reads, apo oinon, ' from 
wine,' which partakes of the ambiguity of the Hebrew min ; while Codex B (quoted 
above) has huper oinon, 'above wine,' and versions generally' exhibit this reading. 
The renderings of Aquila, Theodotion, and Symmachus are lost. The external 
evidence, so far as it has come down to us in ancient translations, is rather in favor 
of giving a comparative power to min, "red [or dark] above wine, white above 
milk;" but the internal evidence preponderates in favor of the causative sense, 
"red [dark] with wine, white with milk." The nth verse predicts an abundance 
of grape-juice, in which (speaking figuratively) the children of Judah should wash 
their clothes, and we are naturally prepared for an allusion in the 12th verse to 
some effect of that abundance, such as is indicated by the words, "His eyes shall 
be red with wine." The other rendering introduces a contrast not in harmony 
with the context, and which raises the question, Why should his eyes be described 
as redder (or darker) than wine, and his teeth as whiter than milk? It may be 
answered, indeed, that joy from the profusion of Divine mercies would cause the 
eyes to sparkle ; but this answer eliminates from khaklili the idea of color (for the 
eye is neither red nor dark because it sparkles), and it fails to explain why the 
teeth are said to be whiter than milk. Accepting, then, the English version as 
correctly rendering min by 'with,' we have to inquire, What is intended by this 
redness or darkness of eyes from an abundance of yayin ? Some critics have 
sanctioned the interpretation which connects this prophecy with the inflammatory 
redness or darkness of eye produced by excessive drinking; 'red,' as indicating the 
fierce flashing glances excited by alcoholic wine, or 'dark,' as denoting the dull, 



24 GENESIS, XLIX. II, 12. 

lack-lustre expression of the inebriate's eye. It is true that 'redness of eyes' is 
one feature in Solomon's portraiture of the drunkard; but this fact illustrates the 
proposition that 'the letter,' even of Scripture, may kill, if the spirit be overlooked. 
Piety revolts at the suggestion that Jacob promised as a blessing that which 
Solomon portrays as a curse. Professor Lee justly denounces this immoral exegesis ; 
but when he substitutes for it the brightness of the eye 'refreshed' by moderate 
draughts of wine, he lays himself open to a triad of objections: First, that he 
excludes from khaklili the idea of color ; secondly, that he makes this khaklili to 
depend on a limitation of wine, and not, as the passage itself implies, on its profusion ; 
and thirdly, that the 'refreshing' effect he associates with the moderate use of wine 
is, physiologically, different in degree only from that which he condemns. When 
the eyes are lighted up with wine, can the brain be said to be perfectly sober ? Has 
not the drinker then reached a stage of vinosity when he may regard himself as 
'elevated,' but when calmer observers must look upon him as perceptibly lowered 
in his rational and moral standing? 

These expositions may all be considered faulty, as based on the assumption that 
the phrase ' red as to his eyes ' has regard to an appearance of the organ of vision 
itself; whereas nothing more may be intended than a dark red or deep-colored 
appearance round about the eyes, such as would be produced by contact with 'the 
blood of the grape.' Those who washed their very clothes in the flowing juice 
might be appropriately described as carrying the marks of it on their faces ; or if 
allusion is made to the crowded wine-press and the 'crushing swains,' what is more 
natural than to suppose the juice dashing and coloring with its spray the eyes of 
the gleeful treaders? The same usus loquendi is seen in 2 Kings ix. 30, 'And she 
[Jezebel] painted her face' — vattasem bap-puk ainiha ; literally, 'And she put into 
painting [or pigment] her eyes.' So Ezek. xxiii. 40, 'Thou paintedst thy eyes ' — 
kakhalt ainaik. Pliny says of the Roman ladies, that they were given to self- 
decoration, 'that their eyes must be painted' (or dyed) — ut tinguantur oculi 
quoque. In these and other instances the reference is not to the organ of sight 
itself, but to the eyelid, eyebrow, or other parts of the face. The English idiom 
furnishes parallel examples. In the familiar phrase, 'eyes red with weeping,' it is 
the border of the eyes, the cheek contiguous, which is meant; and in the 'blackened 
eye' some adjacent part. We conclude that khaklili indicates the color of the 
expressed juice of the grape, which (unless the juice were itself red) would take 
a purple hue from the coloring matter of the skin ; and this purple, being a rich 
deep color, forms the best possible contrast to the whiteness of milk. The 12th 
verse may, therefore, be rendered, "Empurpled are his eyes with grape-juice, and 
white are his teeth with milk." Schumann explains the last clause, "as if milk 
distilled from his teeth." The description is redolent of the field and the fold, at 
once poetical and prefigurative, but yielding no approval, direct or indirect, to the 
use of intoxicating drinks. 

In these verses what is said of Judah is, in reality, predicted of his descendants, 
whose future territory in the Promised Land was to be so prolific in vines, strong 
and of the finest quality, that young animals could be everywhere tied to them; 
while the vines should be so fruitful that, besides the quantities of grapes consumed 
as solid fruit, the clusters should yield enough juice to form streams like water, in 
which, if needful, the garments of the people could be bathed. The grape-treaders 
would be stained with wine up to their eyes ; and being blessed with pastoral as well 
as agricultural wealth, their teeth would seem as if made white by the milk they 
should consume. This promised abundance of vine-fruit and milk may be under- 



GENESIS, XLIX. II, 12. 2$ 

stood as indicating the fertility of Judah's soil, and the fecundity of his flocks and 
herds. Whether a typical allusion to Messianic times is included under this 
description the reader must judge for himself. 'Judah' has been regarded as 
representative of the Redeemer, and also as collectively symbolizing the Christian 
church. The Targumists connect these verses with the 18th verse, and construe 
them exclusively of the Messiah and His warlike achievements. Even Onkelos, 
who is generally concise, and keeps close to the Hebrew, here becomes diffuse, 
though he is outdone both by Jonathan and the Jerusalem interpreter. Their three 
paraphrases are translated in a foot-note, and prove how little the cultivated Jewish 
mind could, of itself, and even with the aid of the prophets, have developed that 
ideal of suffering yet triumphant Goodness, which the Gospels supply in the life 
of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.* 

* The Targum of Onkelos reads — "Israel shall dwell in his city; the people shall build his 
temple, and they shall be righteous in his city, and doers of the law according to his doctrine. The 
finest crimson shall be his clothing, and his apparel shall be of silk dyed with scarlet and diverse 
colors. His mountains shall be red with vineyards, and his hills shall flow with wine (ba-khamar) ; 
his fields shall be white with corn and flocks of sheep." 

The Targum of Jonathan runs: — "How beautiful is king Messiah, about to spring forth from 
the house of Judah ! He shall gird His loins and descend to make ready the battle array against 
His enemies, slaying kings with their nobles ; nor is there a king or noble who shall stand before 
Him who reddens the mountains with the blood of the slain, and whose blood-stained clothes 
resemble the skin of grapes. Beautiful as wine (k'khamrah) are the eyes of king Messiah, nor is 
He able to look upon impure connections and the effusion of innocent blood ; His teeth are pure 
from milk, so that they shall not eat the spoil of rapine and violence ; and therefore His mountains 
and winepresses shall be red with wine (mitt khamrak), and His hills shall be white with (mitt) corn 
and the wool of sheep." 

The Jerusalem Targum' is pitched in the same allegorical strain: — "How beafitiful is king 
Messiah, about to spring forth from the house of Judah ! He binds up his loins, and goes forth 
in battle array against those who hate Him, slaughtering kings with their nobles ; He dyes the vines 
red with the blood of their slain, and turns the hills white with the fat of their mighty men. His gar- 
ments are stained with blood, and He resembles one employed in treading grapes. How beautiful 
in their appearance are the eyes of king Messiah from wine ! (min khamrah), so that He cannot 
behold impure connections and the shedding of innocent blood. His teeth are rather employed in 
sacred rites than in eating the prey of robbery and violence ; His mountains are red with (min) vines, 
and His winepresses with His wine (khamrah) ; His hills are white with the abundance of corn and 
flocks of sheep." 



THE BOOK OF EXODUS. 



Chapter III. Verse 8. 

And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the 
Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land 
and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey. 



Flowing with milk and honey] Hebrew, zahvath khahlav u-d y vash. ' Milk 
and honey ' are used for the general produce of the land, and ' flowing with ' is a 
striking figure of abundance. Concerning debash, see note on Gen. xliii. II. The 
phrase ' flowing with milk and honey ' has a proverbial iteration in the Pentateuch. 
Besides the above passage, it occurs in Exod. iii. 17; xiii. 5; xxxiii. 3; Lev. xx. 
24; Numb. xiii. 27; xiv. 8; xvi. 13, 14; Deut. vi. 3; xi. 9; xxvi. 9, 15 ; xxvii. 3; 
xxxi. 20. Also in Josh. v. 6; Jer. xi. 5; xxxii. 22; Ezek. xx. 6, 15. 



Chapter VII. Verse 24. 

And all the Egyptians digged round about the river for water to 
drink ; for they could not drink of the water of the river. 



The Nile was emphatically the river of Egypt — its only river, — and, as rain 
seldom fell, the main source of its water supply for irrigation and potable use. 
The deliciousness of the Nile water passed into a proverb, and it was considered so 
fattening that (according to a tradition preserved by Plutarch) the sacred bull 
Apis was not allowed to drink of it. The modern Turks are said to excite their 
thirst for it by the use of salt. That the water of their beloved river, to which 
they paid divine honors, should have been made loathsome to them, was one of 
the severest trials possible to the Egyptians, and one of the most forcible evidences 
which the God of Israel could exhibit of His supremacy over the deities in which 
they trusted. 



Chapter XII. Verses 8, 15, 17—20, 34, 39. 
8 And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roasted with fire, and un- 
leavened bread ; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it. . . . is Seven 
days shall ye eat unleavened bread ; even the first day ye shall put 
away leaven out of your houses : for whosoever eateth leavened bread 
from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from 
Israel. . . . i 7 And ye shall observe the feast of unleavened bread. 
. . . 18 In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at 



EXODUS, XII. 8, 15, 17—20, 34, 39. 27 

even, ye shall eat unleavened bread, until the one and twentieth day 
of the month at even. 19 Seven days shall there be no leaven found 
in your houses: for whosoever eateth that which is leavened, even 
that soul shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he 
be a stranger, or born in the land. 20 Ye shall eat nothing leavened; 
in all your habitations shall ye eat unleavened bread. . . . 34 And the 
people took their dough before it was leavened, their kneading-troughs 
being bound up in their clothes upon their shoulders. " . . .39 And 
they baked unleavened cakes of the dough which they brought forth 
out of Egypt, for it was not leavened ; because they were thrust out of 
Egypt, and could not tarry, neither had they prepared for themselves 
any victual. 



V. 8, 15, 17, 18, 20, 39. Unleavened bread] The Hebrew is matzoth, 
'sweet things,' in all these passages. [On Matzoth, see Note on Gen. xix. 3.] 
In ver. 8 the Lxx. reads azuma, 'unleavened things,' and the Vulgate azymos 
panes, 'unleavened loaves.' In ver. 15 the Lxx. has azuma, the Vulgate azyma. 
In ver. 17 a singular variation occurs. The Hebrew- Samaritan text, which is 
followed by the Samaritan version, has matzvah, 'precept,' instead of matzoth ; so 
that instead of "And ye shall observe [or attend to] the unleavened things," it 
represents as the true reading, "And ye shall observe the precept." This reading 
is followed by the Lxx., which has teen entoleen tauteen, 'this command.' But 
the Vulgate follows our present Hebrew text, and reads azyma, 'unleavened 
things ' ; and the same reading was evidently in the MSS. used by the Targumists. 
Several Jewish rabbis regard the words as a command to watch the unleavened 
cakes, lest they became accidentally leavened ; and one rabbi draws the spiritual 
inference that care should be taken to keep the true doctrine from becoming 
corrupted by error.* In ver. 18, 20, the Lxx. has azuma, the Vulgate azyma. 
In v. 39, ugoth matzoth, rendered in the A. V. 'unleavened cakes,' is literally 
' cakes — unfermented ones '; in the Lxx. it is azumous, ' unleavened ' [_artous, loaves, 
being understood] ; and in the Vulgate panes azymos, 'loaves unleavened.' 

V. 15, 19. Leaven] The Hebrew is seor, Lxx. zumee, Vulgate fermentum. 
Seor is supposed to be a derivative of soar, an unused root, related to shoar and 
sir, 'to boil up,' 'bubble up.' Zed, from which comes the Greek zumee, and 
ferveo, the root of the Latin fermentum, have similar significations. Seor may be 
regarded as any substance capable of producing- fermentation, — all yeasty or decaying 
albuminous matter. Such a substance tenaciously adheres to vessels containing 
fermented fluids, however carefully racked; and among a people possessed of 
imperfect refining contrivances, the command to put away all seor out of their 
houses and accustomed quarters during the passover feast, could never have been 
rigidly carried out if fermented liquors had been retained upon their premises. 
Seor occurs only in three other places — Exod. xiii. 7 ; Lev. ii. 1 1 ; and Deut. 
xvi. 4, — where it is rendered 'leavened bread.' Seor is supposed by some critics 
to enter into the composition of mishereth [_s being changed into sh~\, rendered in 
the plural ' kneading-troughs ' (ver. 34). The word also occurs Exod. viii. 3, 
and Deut. xxviii. 5, 17. Others prefer to derive it from shah-ar, 'to be left' or 
'remain,' and understand by mishereth the remains of the dough left over from a 



* This recalls Paul's comparison in i Cor. v. 6 — 8. 



28 EXODUS, XII. 8, 15, 17 — 20, 34, 39. 

previous baking; and to this construction the Lxx., Vulgate, and Targums 
incline : but that the reference is to some portable vessels used in the preparation 
of dough seems certain from the context in each of the places where the word 
occurs. Seor is related to the word sour — being, in fact, the 'sourer,' — and hence 
contrasts with matzah, 'the sweet' or 'fresh,' unspoilt. 

V. 15. Leavened bread] Hebrew, khahmatz; Lxx. zumeen ; Vulgate fer- 
mentatum. Khahmatz is generically any fermented substance — anything which 
has been subject to the action of seor. It might seem superfluous to raise the 
question whether khahmatz includes liquids as well as solids, since it is equivalent 
to asking whether fermentation is itself or something different. The modern 
Jews differ in their view of this question ; for though they generally include under 
khahmatz fermented fluids made from corn, the majority of them do not include 
under it fermented wine. This inconsistency is defended by a theory of the 
mediaeval Rabbins, " that the juices of fruits, including grape-juice, do not ferment." 
Now it must have been patent to all careful observers, first, that the juice of 
crushed grapes did ferment — 'boil up' or 'bubble' — when left exposed to the 
air for some hours, and without the adoption of preventive measures ; and secondly, 
that the cause of this fermentation was the prior fermentation of something (gluten) 
in the grape, which had thus become a powerful ferment, i. e. a seor. This seor 
decomposes the sugar of the grape-juice (glucose), the elements of which, entering 
into a new chemical relation, are changed into alcohol and carbonic acid gas. [See 
Note on Gen. 29. ] 

V. 19. That which is leavened] In ver. 19 the Hebrew kal okal makhmetzeth 
is literally " every one eating [or consuming] a fermented thing, " — from khahmatz as 
above. In ver. 19 and 20 the Lxx. has zumoton, the Vulgate fer??ientalum. In 
ver. 20, "Ye shall eat nothing leavened," the Hebrew stands kal makhmetzeth 
lo tokalu, " everything fermented ye shall not eat." 

V. 34. Before it was leavened] The Hebrew is terem yekhmatz ; the Lxx., 
pro tou zumotheenai ; the Vulgate, antequam fertnentaretur. 

V. 39. For it was not leavened] The Hebrew, ki lo khamatz ; Lxx., ougar 
ezumothee ; Vulgate, neque enim poterant fermentari. 



The substance of this decree may be succinctly stated. From the 14th day of 
the month Nisan, nothing that could cause fermentation, or that had undergone 
fermentation, was to be found in the houses, or to be used as articles of food by 
the Jewish people. The decree was strict, absolute, and universal, admitting of 
no exception as to place or person during the period named. To guard against a 
possible violation, the Rabbins afterward included the 14th day in the prohibited 
term — so far, at least, as to make a diligent search that every particle of the pro- 
scribed substance might be put away. The loss of civil and religious privileges 
was to follow disobedience to this statute — that is, as we may suppose, where the 
violation arose from willful carelessness or contempt, and not from involuntary 
oversight. The rigor of the law was, doubtless, mitigated in its administration by 
a regard to extenuating circumstances. 

Observation I. The prohibition against the presence of ferment and the use of all 
fermented articles is very explicit and emphatic, and the penalty for disobedience 
reads exceedingly severe. That a capital penalty was intended is, however, too 
probable, though some sentence resembling outlawry is involved. 

2. That a prohibition so strongly declared and supported was not arbitrary in its 
origin is unquestionable, unless the divine legation of Moses is wholly rejected. 



EXODUS, xvii. 3, 5, 6. 29 

A perpetuated remembrance of the embittered condition of their forefathers was 
one object to be secured. But the principal reason must be sought in that asso- 
ciation of ideas by which ferment and fermented things were regarded as symbolical 
of moral corruption and disorder. [See Notes on Matt. xvi. 6, 11, 12; 1 Cor. v. 
7, 8.] Plutarch, in his 'Roman Questions* (109), and Gellius, in his 'Attic 
Nights,' remark that the priests of Jupiter were not permitted to touch leaven, 
because it was the product and producer of corruption. 

3. No plea that would exempt fermented liquors from the sweep of this pro- 
hibition can be sustained, without ignorantly assuming a difference that does not 
exist, and ascribing the same ignorance to the lawgiver of Israel. The practice of 
the modern Jews is not uniform, some using fermented wine during the passover, 
and others an unfermented wine prepared from the maceration of raisins. But 
were their practice uniformly in favor of fermented wine, it would but furnish 
another and quite superfluous evidence of the Jewish tendency to "make void the 
law of God by their traditions." 



Chapter XIII. Verses 6, 7. 

6 Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread, and in the seventh 
shall be a feast to the Lord. 7 Unleavened bread shall be eaten 
seven days; and there shall no leavened bread be seen with thee, 
neither shall there be leaven seen with thee in all thy quarters. 



V. 6. Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth; Lxx., azuma; Vulgate, azymis 
and azyma. 

V. 7. Leavened bread] Hebrew, kkahmatz, 'what is fermented'; Lxx., 
zumoton; Vulgate, aliquid fermentatum. 

Leaven] Hebrew, seor; Lxx., zumee. The Vulgate is without a word, 'fer- 
mentatum ' or ' fermentum ' having to be supplied by the reader. 

Thy quarters] That is, all their accustomed places, such as dwelling-rooms, 
cellars, etc. The ferment was doubtless carried out from these to outhouses or 
caves. 

Chapter XVII. Verses 3, 5, 6. 

3 And the people thirsted there for water; and the people mur- 
mured against Moses, and said, Wherefore is this that thou hast 
brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children, and our 
cattle, with thirst ? . . . 5 And the Lord said unto Moses, Go 
on before the people, and take with thee of the elders of Israel; and 
thy rod, wherewith thou smotest the river, take in thine hand, and 
go. 6 Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; 
and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, 
that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the 
elders of Israel. 



The murmuring of the Israelites for water, and for no other beverage, while it 
was a sad evidence of their unbelief, showed that while in Egypt they had little, if 
any, acquaintance with other drinks. Had they formed an attachment to other 
liquids, discontent at their absence would certainly have been expressed, as it was 
at the absence of the familiar fish, fowl, onions, and leeks. To satisfy their reason^ 



30 exodus, xxii. 5, 29. 

able desire for water (though unreasonably and irreverently manifested) the rock in 
Horeb gave forth the stream which followed them in their subsequent desert 
wanderings. No stronger draughts, for health and strength, were required by 
them, their wives, and little ones, contrary to the opinion still prevalent which 
associates intoxicating liquor with necessary diet and refreshment. On this point 
ancient facts upset modern theory. 



Chapter XXI. Verses 28, 29. 
28 If an ox gore a man or a woman, that they die; then the ox 
shall be surely stoned, and his flesh shall not be eaten; but the 
owner of the ox shall be quit. 29 But if the ox were wont to push 
with his horn in time past, and it hath been testified to his owner, 
and he hath not kept him in, but that he hath killed a man or 
a woman; the ox shall be stoned, and his owner also shall be put to 
death. 

This Mosaic regulation was designed to impress the Jewish mind with the value 
of human life, and the duty of preventing whatever might endanger it. The pas- 
sage plainly teaches — the lesson is world-wide and for all time — that in the Divine 
sight men are responsible for consequences which they may prevent, but do not; 
and it is no justification to plead that the consequences were not inevitable, nor 
designed, nor foreseen. Who can plead ignorance that the tendency of strong 
drink is to create a diseased craving for itself, or that the common sale of it actu- 
ally and extensively produces habits of intemperance? And when these tendencies 
and results are clearly declared and well understood, the personal duty of abstinence 
from intoxicating liquor, and the national duty of legislative prohibition of traffic in 
it, become abundantly plain. Such a duty may be described as 'expediency,' but 
it is at any rate an expediency the neglect of which places the neglecters in no 
enviable position. Ignorance and error may be innocent, but not when they result 
from a voluntary rejection of knowledge. The existence of Temperance Societies 
thus increases the responsibility of all classes. 



Chapter XXII. Verse 5. 
If a man shall cause a field or vineyard to be eaten, and shall 
put in his beast, and shall feed in another man's field; of the best oi 
his own field, and of the best of his own vineyard, shall he make 
restitution. 

Vineyard] Hebrew, kerem. To 'cause a field or vineyard to be eaten,' is an 
elliptical mode of expression. Bah-ar signifies to eat or consume, and is here 
used in the Piel conjugation to express the devastation which loose cattle would 
make in a field or vineyard. That the owner of the cattle should compensate in 
kind for the injury done was an equitable regulation. The Samaritan and Lxx. 
versions extend the verse by inserting after 'man's field' the following: — "he shah 
make restitution according to his produce; but if he has destroyed the whole field 
[of another], of the best," etc. 



Chapter XXII. Verse 29. 
Thou shalt not delay to offer the first of thy ripe fruits, and of thy 
liquors. 



EXODUS, XXIII. II, 15, 1 8. 31 

The first of thy ripe fruits] The Hebrew is a single word, melaathkah, 
literally 'thy fullness,' or 'abundance,' here used to signify the first fruits due to 
the Giver of all good, and serving to remind the people that they were called upon 
to render to His service out of the abundance of His beneficence to them. " Freely 
ye have received, freely give." 

And of thy liquors] Hebrew, ve-dimakah, * and of thy tear ' ; from dema, 
*& tear,' an expressive metaphor of the gums and rich juices of trees and fruits that 
spontaneously drop from them. The same idiom is presented in the Greek dakruon 
ton dendron, and the Latin arborum lacrimce, 'tears of trees.' In Spain a wine 
called lagrima is made from the droppings of muscatel grapes, which, " melting with 
ripeness, are suspended in bunches " (Redding on Wines, p. 58); and the famous 
Tokay wine, or Tokay Ausbruch, i. e. flowing forth, derives its name from 
the juice which drops form the unpressed grapes grown in a single Hungarian 
vineyard. These droppings form the 'essence of Tokay,' which, when mixed with 
the juice of the vat in the proportion of 61 parts to 84 of the latter, compose the 
'Tokay Ausbruch.' Quite different from these droppings are 'the tears of the 
vine,' a limpid distillation of the sap at the time the plant is budding (Redding, 

P. 50)- 

The Lxx. renders the passage dparchas halonos kai leenou sou, ' the fruits of the 

threshing-floor and thy wine-press.' The Vulgate reads, decimds tuas et primitias 

tuas, 'thy tenths and thy firstfruits.' Rosenmiiller states, "Some understand by 

dema the best and choicest part of anything, since the liquor or sweetness which 

flows spontaneously from trees, vines, and shrubs, is their choicest produce." 

Kalisch renders "from the abundance of thy corn and the choicest of thy wine." 



Chapter XXIII. Verse ii. 

In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy 
oliveyard. 

With thy vineyard] Le-karmekah. The soil was to be tilled and sown for 
six years in succession ; on the seventh it was to lie fallow, and what it spontane- 
ously produced was to be for the use, first of the poor, and then of the ' beasts of 
the field.' This humane law was applicable both to vineyards and oliveyards. 



Chapter XXIII. Verses 15, 18. 
is Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread : (thou shalt eat 
unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time 
appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou earnest out from Egypt; 
and none shall appear before me empty.) ... 18 Thou shalt 
not offer the blood of my sacrifices with leavened bread. 



V. 15. The feast of unleavened bread] Hebrew, eth khag ham-matzotk, 
'the festival of unfermented things.' [See Note on Exod. xii.] Lxx.,azuma; 
Vulgate, azymorum. 

The month Abib] A bib is the same as Nizan, the first month of the ecclesi- 
astical year, and seventh of the civil year, the commencement of the Syrian spring- 
time, corresponding to part of our March and April. 



32 EXODUS, XXX. 9. 



V. 18. With leavened bread] Hebrew, al-khahmatz, 'with what is fer- 
mented ' ; Lxx., epi zumee, ' with leaven ' ; Vulgate, super femiento, ' upon leaven.' 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 2. 

And unleavened bread, and cakes unleavened tempered with oil, 
and wafers unleavened anointed with oil ; of wheaten flour shalt thou 
make them. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, lekhem maizoth, 'bread of unfermented mate- 
rials,' i. e. a loaf made of unfermented dough. 

And cakes -unleavened] Hebrew, ve-khallath 7natzoth, 'and perforated 
cakes of unfermented materials.' 

And wafers unleavened] Hebrew, u-rqiqai matzoth, 'and thin-cakes of 
unfermented materials. ' 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 23. 

And one loaf of bread, and one cake of oiled bread, and one wafer 
out of the basket of unleavened bread that is before the Lord. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, ham-matzoth, ' the unfermented articles,' i. e. 
those enumerated in ver. 2. 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 40. 
And the fourth part of an hin of wine for a drink-offering. 



A hin of wine] Hebrew, ka-hin yayin, 'the hin of yayin.' According to 
Josephus, it was equal to two Attic choes, each choes equal to six English pints ; so 
that the hin was twelve pints, and the fourth part was three pints, English. 

For a drink-offering] Hebrew, ve-nasek, 'and (as) a libation,' from nahsak, 
'to pour out' The A. V. tends to convey the mistaken idea of nasek as an offer- 
ing to be drunk. The Lxx. reads, kai spondeen to tetraton tou ein oinou, ' and for 
a libation the fourth part of a hin of wine.' The Vulgate has et vinum ad libandum 
ejusde?n mensurce, 'and wine of the same measure for pouring out.' 



It may be asked, How could this command be carried out in the wilderness ? 

Of course, obedience to all or any of the Levitical ordinances was dependent on 
the possession of adequate resources. Many of the prescriptions could not be 
completely complied with till after the arrival of Israel in the promised land. 
Some wine, however, was procurable during the desert sojourn, as appears from 
Lev. x. 9. For one explanation, see the legend of the Targum, quoted in the 
Note on Cant. i. 14. 

Chatter XXX. Verse 9. 
Ye shall offer no strange incense thereon, nor burnt sacrifice, nor 
meat-offering; neither shall ye pour drink-offering thereon. 

Drink-offering] See Note above on chap. xxix. 40. 



exodus, xxxiv. 18, 25. 33 

Chapter XXXIV. Verse 18. 

The feast of unleavened bread shalt thou keep. Seven days thou 
shalt eat unleavened bread, as I commanded thee, in the time of the 
month Abib : for in the month Abib thou earnest out from Egypt. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented cakes.' 



Chapter XXXIV. Verse 25. 
Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven. 



With leaven] Hebrew, al-khakmatz, ' with what is fermented ' ; Lxx., epi zumee, 
with leaven'; Vulgate, super fermento, 'upon leaven.' 



THE BOOK OF LEVITICUS. 



Chapter II. Verse 4. 

And if thou bring an oblation of a meat offering baken in the oven, 
it shall be unleavened cakes of fine flour mingled with oil, or unleavened 
wafers anointed with oil. 

Unleavened cakes] Hebrew, kholloth matzoth, 'perforated cakes, unfer- 
mented.' [See Note on Exod. xxix. 2.] 

And unleavened wafers] Hebrew, u-rqiqai matzoth, 'and thin cakes unfer- 
mented.' 



•Chapter II. Verse 5. 

And if thy oblation be a meat offering baken in a pan, it shall be of 
fine flour unleavened, mingled with oil. 



Unleavened] Hebrew, matzah, 'sweet' or 'fresh.' Observe that the con- 
ventional word ' unleavened ' does not express the wide meaning of unfermented. 



Chapter II. Verse ii. 

No meat offering, which ye shall bring unto the Lord, shall be 
made with leaven : for ye shall burn no leaven, nor any honey, in 
any offering of the Lord made by fire. 



Shall be made with leaven] Hebrew, ta-ahseh khahmdtz, 'shall be made 
with a fermented-substance.' 

For ye shall burn no leaven, nor any honey] Hebrew, ki kahl-seorvekahl- 
devash lo taqtiru, "for every [ = any] ferment and every [ = any] honey ye shall 
not burn." No seor (yeast, or fermenting substance) was to be present. The 
extension of this prohibition to honey {debasli) has been referred to the readiness 
with which honey ferments in contact with ferment. Others suppose that honey 
was excluded because commonly used in heathen worship. Some find allegorical 
reasons for the prohibition, as Baal Hatturim: — "Honey is forbidden because the 
evil concupiscence is as sweet unto a man as honey." The question whether by 
debash was here intended the honey of bees or of dates, or grape-juice reduced to a 
honeyed consistence by boiling, or whether it included all kinds, cannot be satisfac- 
torily settled. As in the next verse 'honey' is associated with the oblation of 



LEVITICUS, VIII. 2, 26. 35 

firstfruits, there may be reason for the note of Rabbi Solomon Jarchi, who under- 
stands by it 'the firstfruits of figs and dates.' 



Chapter VI. Verse 16. 

And the remainder thereof shall Aaron and his sons eat : with 
unleavened bread shall it be eaten in the holy place ; in the court 
of the tabernacle of the congregation they shall eat it. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented-cakes.' 



Chapter VI. Verse 17. 
It shall not be baken with leaven. I have given it unto them for 
their portion of my offerings made by fire ; it is most holy, as is the 
sin-offering, and as the trespass-offering. 



Leaven] Hebrew, khahmatz, 'fermented-matter. 1 



Chapter VII. Verse 12. 

If he offer it for a thanksgiving, then he shall offer with the sacrifice 
of thanksgiving unleavened cakes mingled with oil, and unleavened 
wafers anointed with oil, and cakes mingled with oil, of fine flour, 
fried. 



Unleavened cakes] Hebrew, kholloth matzoth, 'perforated unfermented- 
cakes.' 

And unleavened wafers] Hebrew, u-riqiqai matzoth, t and thin unfermented- 
cakes.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 13. 

Besides the cakes, he shall offer for his offering leavened bread with 
the sacrifice of thanksgiving of his peace offerings. 



Leavened bread] Hebrew, lekhem khahmatz, 'bread fermented. 



Chapter VIII. Verse 2. 
Take Aaron and his sons with him, and the garments, and the 
anointing oil, and a bullock for the sin offering, and two rams, and a 
basket of unleavened bread. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented-cakes.' 



Chapter VIII. Verse 26. 
And out of the basket of unleavened bread, that was before the 
Lord, he took one unleavened cake, and a cake of oiled bread, and 
one wafer, and put them on the fat, and upon the right shoulder. 



36 LEVITICUS, X. 8 — II. 

Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented-cakes.' 
Unleavened cake] Hebrew, kallath matzah, ' perforated unfermented-cake. 



Chapter X. Verses 8 — n. 

8 And the' Lord spake unto Aaron, saying, 9 Do not drink wine 
nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the 
tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die : it shall be a statute for 
ever throughout your generations : io And that ye may put difference 
between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean ; u And 
that ye may teach the children of Israel all the statutes which the 
Lord hath spoken unto them by the hand of Moses. 



Do NOT DRINK wine nor strong drink] Hebrew, yayin ve-shakar al-tasht, 
'yayin and shakar thou shalt not drink.' The Lxx. gives oinon kai sikera ou 
piesthe, 'wine and sikera ye shall not drink.' The V. has vinum et omne quod 
inebriare potest non bibetis, ' wine and whatever is able to inebriate ye shall not 
drink.' On Shakar, which here occurs for the first time as a noun, see Pre- 
liminary Dissertation. Whether the noun was derived from the verb — which 
signifies 'to drink freely of the sweet,' — or whether the verb was formed from 
the noun (the name of the thing — ' sweet juice ' — being borrowed to describe its 
copious consumption, i. e. to shakarize, to drink largely of shakar), there is nothing 
that necessarily connects the word, as verb or noun, with intoxicating qualities. 
Shakar may have originally denoted sweet juice of all kinds ; but when distin- 
guished from yayin (as here), may be regarded as generically referable to any sweet 
juice except the juice of the grape; just as yayin generically included the juice 
of the grape, however expressed or prepared. When shakar in its fresh state was 
mixed, either by accident or design, with a ferment, or time was allowed for its 
own albumen to decay, it would itself become fermented, and if then freely drunk, 
would intoxicate the drinker. But it is contrary to evidence and probability to 
suppose that shakar was drunk in that state only, and that ' to shakarize ' was 
always tantamount to excessive indulgence in a fermented liquor. 

The Lxx. in this place merely gives shakar a Greek garb — sikera ; yet sikera 
was never a word current among classical Greek writers, or even in Hellenistic 
Greek, — i. e. the language as modified by the idioms of the Jews who wrote and 
spoke it. When, therefore, the lexicographers say that sikera signified ' all intoxi- 
cating liquors except wine,' they mean that shakar ha.d that signification; but such 
a definition is intrinsically defective. Judea was celebrated for its palms; and 
palm-juice got by tapping the tree, or squeezing the date-fruit, may have first given 
occasion to the name, which would extend its reference as the sweet juices of other 
plants came into frequent use. Probably related to shakar was the Greek sakcharon, 
applied to the juice of the sugar-cane; from this sprang the Latin saccharum, from 
which the English household word ' sugar ' is circuitously derived. The rendering 
of the Vulgate is periphrastic, and at the same time incorrect, if designed (as it 
doubtless was by St Jerome) to cover the whole meaning of the Hebrew shakar. 
The Targumists Onkelos and Jonathan in this place (and in this alone) render 
shakar by the Chaldee marvai and rn'ravai, derived from ravah, 'to drink largely, ' 
'to drench,' and 'to make drunk' where the drink consumed was intoxicating, — 



LEVITICUS, X. 8 — II. 37 

thus taking a similar extension of meaning to shakar, except that in mWavai the 
idea of sweetness in the article used was not distinctly conveyed. 



Observe — I. The matters of the prohibition — yayin and shakar. — If it be asked 
why all kinds of yayin (grape-juice) and of shakar (sweet juice in general) were 
prohibited, when the spirit of the interdict was limited to intoxicating species of 
both, it may be replied either (i) that the avoidance of all juices of the grape and 
other fruit when expressed was desirable in order to guard against mistake, where 
mistake would be so baneful ; or (2) that the command was left to be interpreted 
by its spirit, just as a prohibition in the present day against ' drink ' or ' liquor ' 
would be universally understood as not extending to all drink and all liquor, but 
as applicable only to that of an intoxicating quality. The former view is confirmed 
by the extension of the Nazarites' vow of abstinence even to vine-fruit. The Rev. 
John Wesley, in his New Testament Notes, observes on the prohibition, " Nor 
eat grapes — forbidden him for greater caution, to keep him at the further distance 
from wine." 

2. The occasion of the prohibition. — The Jewish rabbis, and most Christian com- 
mentators, connect it with the sin of Nadab and Abihu, described in ver. I ; and 
the ground of this connection they find in the supposed commission of their 
sacrilege while under the influence of intoxicating drink. The Targum of Jonathan 
contains the clause, "As did thy sons, who died by the burning of fire. " Keil and 
Delitzsch think that the only connection lay in the rashness of Aaron's sons, and 
the tendency of strong drink to induce a smilar disposition; but this will not 
account for the issue of such a prohibition immediately after such a sin. More 
to the purpose is the language of Rev. J. J. Blunt, B.D. (in his 'Undesigned 
Coincidences of Scripture'): — "Thus far, at least, it is clear that a grievous and 
thoughtless insult is offered to God by two of His priests, for which they are cut 
off; that without any direct allusion to their case, but still very shortly after it had 
happened, a law is issued forbidding the priests the use of wine whe^ about to 
minister. I conclude, therefore, that there was a relation (though it is not asserted) 
between the specific offense and the general law; the more so because the sin 
against which that law is directed is just of a kind to have produced the rash and 
inconsiderate act of which Aaron's sons were guilty." Sad thought! that while 
the people generally, at that time, neither used nor craved for any intoxicating 
drink, two of Aaron's sons and assistants should have indulged in it till they fell 
into heinous guilt, and 'brought upon themselves swift destruction.' Thus early 
had the priests begun to err through wine, and through strong drink to wander 
from the way of obedience and safety. 

3. The extent of the prohibition. — It had respect to all priests, through all 
generations, during all the period of their sacred ministrations. It is a remarkable 
proof of the tendency of the Rabbinical mind to make void the law of God, that 
some of the Jewish doctors of the post-Christian period (such as Maimonides) 
held that this statute was not broken if a small quantity was drunk, with a pause 
of time between, or if mixed with water, etc. Ains worth rejects these equivoca- 
tions. To infer that the use of intoxicating liquor was sanctioned at other times, 
or among other classes, is to overlook, — 

4. The object of the prohibition. — This was to secure the sober, serious, and 
effectual performance of the priestly offices, — those that related to God (the 
discrimination of clean from unclean), and those which regarded the people 
(their instruction in the divine law). "This is a strong reason," observes Dr 
A. Clarke, "why they should drink no inebriating liquor." 



38 LEVITICUS, X. 8 — II. 

5. The solemnity of the prohibition — 'lest ye die.' — The meaning is either "Do 
not drink, lest ye die as the result of disobedience ; " or, "Do not drink, lest ye die 
by imitating Nadab and Abihu's sin, and so incurring their capital penalty." 
This proscription proclaims the concern of the Most High for His own glory, 
for the purity of His worship, the integrity of His ministers, and the welfare of 
His people. 

As legitimate inferences from the whole passage, we may conclude (1) that God 
regards the use of intoxicating liquor as pregnant with danger to His servants, 
whatever their rank and attainments ; (2) that the avoidance of this danger, by 
means of abstinence from such drink, having been a rule of His appointment, is 
still a course worthy of general imitation ; (3) that the adoption of this abstinence 
as a habit of life is specially approved by Him in the case of those who are required 
as 'a holy priesthood' to offer up without ceasing "spiritual sacrifices, acceptable 
to him by Jesus Christ." [See Note on Ezek. xliv. 21, where the continuance of 
this rule is affirmed, and its application to Christian times demanded, unless a 
revival of the Aaronic priesthood and the Levitical service is to be expected.] 
Philo Judseus, the celebrated Alexandrian Jew and Platonist, who was contem- 
porary with Christ, says in his treatise On Drunkenness (sect. 32) in reference to 
this text, "It is almost the only occupation of the priests and ministers of God to 
offer abstemious sacrifices, abstaining in the firmness of their minds from wine and 
from every other cause of folly. But Aaron is the priest, and the interpretation 
of his name is 'mountainous'; reasoning occupying itself with sublime and 
lofty objects. And no one who is so disposed will ever voluntarily touch 
unmixed wine or any other drug (pharmakon) of folly." [See also a quotation 
from Philo in the Note on Ezek. xliv. 21.] Some such impression St Jerome 
appears desirous of conveying in a passage in his letter to Nepotian concerning 
the life to be led by the clergy and monks (de vita clericorum et monachorum). 
In the section on 'feasts to be avoided' {convivia fugiendd) he writes: — 
"The apostle condemns, and the old law forbids, winebibbing priests (Lev. x.). 

Those who serve at the altar may not drink wine and sicera 

Whatever inebriates and throws the mind off its balance, fly, in like manner 
as if it were wine. Nor do I say this in order that a creature of God should 
be condemned by us [Jerome, like many later theologians, confounds the cor- 
ruption of the creature with the creature as formed by God], since, indeed, the 
Lord is called a wine-drinker (Matt, xiv.), and a small portion of wine was al- 
lowed to Timothy when suffering as to his stomach (1 Tim. v.); but in drinking 
we strictly require that there should be a measure according to the age, and the 
state of the health, and of the bodily members. So that if without wine I possess 
the glow of youth, and my blood affords sufficient warmth, and my system is 
vigorous and well strung, cheerfully will I abstain from the cup which is suspected 
to contain a poison.''''* 

If St Jerome, who flourished at the close of the fourth century, reflects in this 
passage the fallacy which attributes salutary, or at least marked medicinal prop- 
erties, to intoxicating liquor ; he no less clearly reflects the profound conviction of 
the purest minds, that the influence of such drink is dangerous to the moral and 



* Vinolentos sacerdotes Apostulus damnat et velus lex prohibet. Qui altario deserviunt vinum 
et siceram non bibant. . . . Quidquid inebriat et statum mentis evertit, fuge similiter ut 
vinum. Nee hoc dico quod Dei a nobis creatura damnetur. Siquidem et Dominos vina potator 
est appellatus, et Timotheo dolenti stomachum modica vini sorbitio relaxata est, sed modum pro 
cctatis et valetudinis et corporuvi qttalitate exigimus in potando. Quod si absque vino ardeo 
adolescentia, et injlammor calore sangtdnis, et succidento validoque sum corpore libenter carebo 
pocula in quo suspicio veneni est. 



LEVITICUS, XXIII. 6, 13, 17. 39 

religious well-being even of those who fill the most sacred offices in the church, 
(4) Finally, if God in His wisdom enforced abstinence and prohibition as His pro- 
phylactic against intemperance within the circle of the priesthood, who can regard 
those measures as needless or extreme remedies for the same evil in general society 
at the present day ? 

Chapter X. Verse 12. 
And Moses spake unto Aaron, and unto Eleazar and unto Ithamar, 
his sons that were left, Take the meat offering that remaineth of the 
offerings of the Lord made by fire, and eat it without leaven beside 
the altar : for it is most holy. 



Without leaven] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented cakes.' 'Eat it with 
sweet [fresh] cakes ' is therefore the proper translation of this clause; 'unleavened,' 
by inference, as opposed to that which had fermented or corrupted. 



Chapter XIX. Verse 10. 
And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou gather 
every grape of thy vineyard; thou shalt leave them for the poor and 
stranger : I am the Lord your God. 



The literal translation of the first two clauses is — 'And thy vineyard [ve-kar- 
mekaJi\ thou shalt not glean, and the scattering of \u-pheref\ thy vineyard \kar- 
mekak] thou shalt not gather.' The grapes left after the first plucking or cutting, 
whether left on the vine or scattered on the ground, should be for the gleaning of 
the poor. [See Note on Deut. xxiv. 21.] 



Chapter XXIII. Verse 6. 
And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of un- 
leavened bread unto the Lord : seven days ye must eat unleavened 
bread. 



Unleavened bread, twice'] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented-cakes.' 



Chapter XXIII. Verse 13. 
And the meat offering thereof shall be two tenth deals of fine flour 
mingled with oil, an offering made by fire unto the Lord for a sweet 
savor : and the drink offering thereof shall be of wine, the fourth 
part of an hin. 

See Note on Exod. xxix. 40. 



Chapter XXIII. Verse 17. 

Ye shall bring out of your habitations two wave loaves of two tenth 
deals : they shall be of fine flour ; they shall be baken with leaven ; 
they are- the firstfruits unto the Lord. 



Leaven] Hebrew, khahmatz, ' fermented matter. ' 



40 LEVITICUS, XXVI. 5. 

Chapter XXV. Verse 3. 
Six years thou shalt sow thy field, and six years thou shalt prune 
thy vineyard, and gather in t!he fruit thereof. 



Thy vineyard] Hebrew, karmekak, 'thy vineyard.' 



Chapter XXV. Verse 4. 
But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a 
sabbath for the Lord : thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy 
vineyard. 

Thy vineyard] Hebrew, karmekah, 'thy vineyard.' 



Chapter XXV. Verse 5. 
That which groweth of its own accord of thy harvest thou shalt not 
reap, neither gather the grapes of thy vine undressed : for it is a year 
of rest unto the land. 

The grapes of thy vine undressed] Hebrew, ve-eth-invai nezirekah to 
thivtzor, 'and the grapes of thy separated thou shalt not gather.' The vine is here 
called nazir (separated or consecrated) because during the seventh year it was not 
to be pruned or plucked. 



Chapter XXV. Verse ii. 

A jubilee shall that fiftieth year be unto you : ye shall not sow, 
neither reap that which groweth of itself in it, nor gather the grapes in 
it of thy vine undressed. 

Nor gather the grapes in it of thy vine undressed] Neither ' grapes ' 
nor 'vine' is in the original Hebrew, which reads, ve-lo thivtzeru eth-nezirah, 
'and thou shalt not gather (or cut off) thy separated.' Each fiftieth year was 
to be like every seventh — a year separated from the ordinary cultivation of the 
soil, and this idea of separation from toil, and consecration to rest, was naturally 
assigned to the whole produce of the land on these septennial and jubilee 
festivals. 



Chapter XXVI. Verse 5. 

And your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage 
shall reach unto the sowing time : and ye shall eat your bread to the 
full, and dwell in your land safely. 



The vintage, twice\ Hebrew, batzir, 'the cutting off,' from bahtzar, 'to cut 
off,' a name transferred to the season when the grapes were gathered, which was 
generally done by cutting them away with a sharp instrument \jnazmara, pruning- 
hook], in order to avoid injury to the vine. 



THE BOOK OF NUMBERS. 



Chapter VI. Verses i- 



i And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, a Speak unto the 
children of Israel, and say unto them, When either man or woman 
shall separate themselves to vow a vow of a Nazarite, to separate them- 
selves unto the Lord : 3 He shall separate himself from wine and 
strong drink, and shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of strong 
drink, neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes, nor eat moist grapes, 
or dried. 4 All the days of his separation shall he eat nothing that 
is made of the vine tree, from the kernels even to the husk. 



V. 2. A Nazarite] The Hebrew nakzir (from nahzar, 'to separate one's self) 
has been retained in the English A. V. The Lxx. reads, " Man or woman, who- 
ever shall specially vow a vow to separate or purify himself with purity to the Lord 
{aneer ee gunee hos ean megalos euxeetai eucheen aphagnisasthai hagneian kurio)." 

V. 3. He shall separate himself from wine and strong drink] The 
Hebrew is miy-yayin ve-shakar yatzir, 'from yayin and shakar he shall separate 
himself.' The Lxx. has apo oinou kai sikera hagnistheesetai, 'from wine and 
sicera he shall purify himself (or purely abstain).' The V. is a vino et omni quod 
inebriare potest abstinebunt, ' from wine and whatever is inebriating they shall 
abstain.' The T. of Onkelos has makhamar khadath ve-atiq yivour, 'from wine, 
new and old, lie shall be separated.' Onkelos thus gives yayin the sense of 'new 
wine,' and shakar that of 'old wine,' which makes their difference to consist, 
not in a difference of the juice, but in a difference of age between portions of the 
same kind of juice, — that of the grape. A rabbinical tradition is mentioned by 
Maimonides, that strong drink made of dates, or such like, was lawful for the 
Nazarite, the kind forbidden here being strong drink made with mixture of wine ! 
Another of these traditions went so far as to state that "if a littie wine be mingled 
with honey, or the like, so that there be no taste of the wine, it is lawful for the 
Nazarite to drink it." What law could survive such unprincipled glosses and 
elastic interpretations ? 

And shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of strong drink] The 
Hebrew is kkometz yayin ve-khometz shakar lo yishteh, ' fermented-liquor of wine 
and fermented-liquor of shakar he shall not drink.' The Lxx. reads, kai oxos ex 
oinou kai oxos ex sicera ou pietai, ' and vinegar (fermented liquor) from wine, and 
vinegar from sicera^ he shall not drink.' The T. of Onkelos gives "the vinegar 
(khol) of wine new, and the vinegar of wine old." The V. has acetum ex vino et 



42 NUMBERS, VI. I — 4. 



ex qualibet alia potione non bibent, ' vinegar from wine and from any other liquor 
they shall not drink.' That the V. should have rendered shakar'm this clause by 
qualibet alia potio is worthy of note. The English A. V. renders khomeiz by 
' vinegar ' in the six places where it occurs in the Old Testament, according to the 
Masorite pointing, — Numb. vi. 3 (twice); Ruth ii. 14; Psa. lxix. 21; Prov. x. 26; 
xxv. 20. The Greek versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, of this 
passage are lost, but in Psa. lxix. 21 and Prov. x. 26 they supply omphax, *an 
unripe (or sour) grape,' which is defended by Michaelis. Dr A. Clarke observes, 
" Khometz signifies fermented wine, and is probably used here to signify wine of a 
strong body, or any highly intoxicating liquor." As the ancients did not scienti- 
fically distinguish between the alcoholic and acetous fermentations, the generic word 
signifying ' fermented ' was used to describe both. In a hot climate, when yayin 
and shakar passed into the alcoholic fermentation, it was difficult to prevent the 
acetous following. It is the general complaint of winemakers on the Continent 
that they cannot keep their wines, or transport them to any distance, without 
mixing them with brandy — a contrivance not available to the ancients. 

Neither shall he drink any liquor of grapes] Hebrew, ve-kahl-mishrath 
anahvim lo yishteh, 'and every (=any) maceration of grapes he shall not drink.' 
Mishrath, from sharah, 'to loosen' or 'macerate,' signifies 'drink made of 
steeped grapes.' (So Gesenius.) Bishop Patrick understands " secondary wine, 
which was made by maceration of grapes in water, after the juice had been pressed 
out to make wine." The Lxx. has kai hosa katergazetai ek staphulees oupietai, ' and 
whatever is concocted (or elaborated) from the grape he shall not drink.' Aquila 
and Symmachus have pasan apobrexin staphulees, ' every infusion of the grape ' ; 
the V., et quidquid de uva exprimitur non bibent, 'and whatever from the grape 
is expressed they shall not drink.' The Syriac gives 'maceration of grapes.' 

Nor EAT moist grapes, or dried] Hebrew, va-anahvim lakhim vivashim 
lo yokal, 'and grapes moist (= fresh) and dried he shall not eat.' The Lxx., 
kai staphuleen prosphaton kai staphida ou phagetai, ' and the grape newly plucked, 
and the raisin, he shall not eat.' The V. has uvas recentes siccasque non comedent, 
' grapes fresh and dried they shall not eat.' Onkelos has rattivin, ' green.' 

V. 4. Of the vine tree] Hebrew, mig-gephen ha-yayin, 'of (or from) the 
vine of the wine,' a phrase intended to mark definitely the nature of gephen, which 
might otherwise be taken to include every kind of flexile, twig-bearing tree. 
Gephen ha-yayin is equivalent to 'wine-yielding plant,' a mode of expression 
implying that yayin is the immediate produce of the vine, and that grape-juice does 
not become yayin by a subsequent fermentation. The Lxx. gives ex ampelou oinon, 
' from the vine wine. ' * The V. has ex vinea, ' what concerns the production of 
wine,' a vineyard, or the vine generically considered. 

From the kernels even to the husks] Hebrew, makharzanim ve-ad zag, 
'from the grapestones to the skin.' The Lxx. has apo stemphullon heos gigartou, 
' from the grapestones unto the husk.* The Vulgate reads, ab uvapassa usque ad 
acinum, 'from the dried grape to the berry-stone.' Dr Gill remarks, "The 
Jews are divided about the two words here used, which of them signifies the outer- 

* The punctuation in Maia's splendid edition of Codex B makes the Lxx. to stand ex ampelou 
oinon apo stemphullon heos gigartou, ' from the vine wine from the grapestones to the husk.' This 
pointing would make oinon identical with the grape or cluster. But oinon may be a copyist's mistake 
for oinou. In the parallel case (Judg. xiii. 14) the Lxx. has ex ampelou tou oiwru, ' from the wine of 
the vine.' 



NUMBERS, VI. 13 — 20. 43 

most part of the grape and which the innermost. Von Gersom agrees with us, but 
it matters not much who are in the right since both are forbidden." 



Chapter VI. Verses 13 — 20. 

13 And this is the law of the Nazarite, when the days of his 
separation are fulfilled: he shall be brought unto the door of the 
tabernacle of the congregation: 14 And he shall offer his offering 
unto the Lord, one he-lamb of the first year without blemish for a 
burnt-offering, and one ewe-lamb of the first year without blemish for 
a sin-offering, and one ram without blemish for peace-offerings, 
15 And a basket of unleavened bread, cakes of fine flour mingled 
with oil, and wafers of unleavened bread anointed with oil, and their 
meat-offering, and their drink-offerings. 16 And the priest shall bring 
them before the Lord, and shall offer his sin-offering, and his burnt- 
offering : 17 And he shall offer the ram for a sacrifice of peace-offer- 
ings unto the Lord, with the basket of unleavened bread : the priest 
shall offer also his meat-offering, and his drink-offering. 18 And the 
Nazarite shall shave the head of his separation at the door of the 
tabernacle of the congregation, and shall take the hair of the head 
of his separation, and put it in the fire which is under the sacrifice of 
the peace-offerings. 19 And the priest shall take the sodden shoulder 
of the ram, and one unleavened cake out of the basket, and one 
unleavened wafer, and shall put them upon the hands of the Nazarite 
after the hair of his separation is shaven : 20 And the priest shall 
wave them for a wave-offering before the Lord : this is holy for the 
priest, with the wave-breast and heave-shoulder : and after that the 
Nazarite may drink wine. 



V. 15. A basket of unleavened bread] Hebrew, ve-sai matzoth, 'and a 
wicker-basket of unfermented-cakes.' 

Wafers of unleavened bread] Hebrew, u-rqiqai matzoth, ' and thin unfer- 
mented-cakes.' 

And their drink-offerings] Hebrew, ve-niskaihem, 'and their libations.' 
[See Note on Exod. xxix. 40.] 

V. 1 7. With a basket of unleavened bread] Hebrew, al sal ham-matzoth, 
'with a basket of the unfermented-cakes.' 

And his drink-offering] Hebrew, ve-eth nisko, 'and his libation.' 

V. 19. One unleavened cake] Hebrew, vl-halklath matzah akhath, 'and 
one perforated unfermented-cake.' 

And one unleavened wafer] Hebrew, u-rqiq matzah ekhad, ' and one thin 
unfermented-cake. ' 

V. 20. And after that the Nazarite may drink wine] Hebrew, 
•ve-akhar yisteh han-Nahzir yayin, 'and afterward the Nazarite may drink yayin. ' 
The ceremony of terminating the vow having been fulfilled, the principal condition 
of Nazaritism would also cease, and with it all the other conditions. Ceasing to 
be a Nazarite, the evidences of a Nazarite would no longer be binding ; but no 
obligation was imposed to drink yayin of any kind, much less was a sanction given 
to the use of inebriating drinks. 



44 NUMBERS, VI. 13 — 20. 

Observation I. The rules of Nazaritism as explained in this chapter comprise 
the three negatives — 1, not to consume any produce of the vine; 2, not to cut 
the hair ; 3, not to touch any dead body. Many speculations have been put forth 
as to the reasons for these prohibitions. That each and all were suitably associ- 
ated with their vow cannot be questioned, for to impute an irrational arbitrariness 
to these regulations would be to impeach the divine wisdom. A Nazarite was, 
by his voluntary vow, so consecrated to the divine service as to be separated from 
the ordinary pursuits of men. This separation was according to the nature of the 
vow ; and if the vow was for life, so was the separation — not otherwise. It is a 
Jewish tradition that the vow could not be taken for less than thirty days. The 
Nazarite was not to touch any dead body, which was typical of his separation from 
things corruptible. He was not to cut his hair, the length of which signified his 
subjection (1 Cor. xi. 5) and visibly testified to his fidelity, and presented the 
symbol of strength and abundant vitality. He was not to take the produce of the 
vine, either liquid or solid, for this was an effectual safeguard not only against 
danger from the use of intoxicating drinks, but also against temptation or mistake 
should the inebriating article be substituted for the innocuous. "They were to 
eat nothing that came of the vine, to teach us with the utmost care and caution 
to avoid sin and everything that borders on it and leads to it, or may be a tempta- 
tion to us." — Matthew Henry. "Everything which might have even a tend- 
ency," says Professor Moses Stuart, "to inspire them with a taste for inebriating 
liquor was to be most carefully avoided." That this abstinence was prescribed 
as a means of moral protection is also clear from the conduct of those who gave 
them wine to drink, 'and so,' says Matthew Henry, 'did the tempter's work.' 
(Amos ii. 12.) Ainsworth remarks, "By this prohibition God taught the 
Nazarites sanctification in mortifying the lusts of the flesh, for the drinking of 
these endangereth men to 'forget the love of God,' to mock and to rage." No 
value can be attached to the rabbinical notion, adopted by Lightfoot, that the 
vine was forbidden to the Nazarites because it had been the forbidden tree 
in Paradise. The leper, according to Lightfoot, was an emblem of the wretched 
state of man since the fall, and the Nazarite the emblem of man in his state of 
innocence. Some Jewish writers, with whom Dr Gill coincides, think that there 
is a meaning in the law of the Nazarite following the law of ordeal concerning 
women suspected of conjugal infidelity, "and as wine leads to adultery, as Jarchi 
observes, abstinence from it, which the Nazarites were obliged to, and forbearance 
of trimming and dressing the hair, and a being more strictly and closely do voted to 
the service of God, were very likely means of preserving from unchastity and any 
suspicion of it." 

2. Ancient Nazaritism was more comprehensive than teetotalism, so that no 
argument against the latter can be founded upon the contrast between Jesus and 
the Baptist [see Note on Matt. xi. 18, 19] ; whereas the remarkable health and 
vigor of the Nazarites (Lam. iv. 7) was a standing refutation of the still prevalent 
superstition which connects those physical blessings with some use of intoxicating 
liquor. 

3. The essential spirit of Nazaritism — self-consecration to God, religious willing- 
hood — is incorporated with Christianity and identified with its highest develop- 
ments of liberty and excellence. Abstinence from intoxicating liquors is, there- 
fore, not less needful than in ancient times as a moral safeguard, unless it can be 
shown that those liquors have ceased to exert the fourfold influence of stimulating 
the animal propensities, weakening the reason, dulling the moral sensibilities, and 
diminishing the will-power. In moderate drinking these influences may be only 



NUMBERS, XIII. I/, 20, 23. 45 

slightly felt, but the tendency cannot be mistaken ; and as the capacity of correctly 
estimating the danger and warding it off is lowered in proportion to the effect of 
the liquor consumed, the drinker is commonly the victim of self-deception until 
some palpable transgression covers him with shame, or until habit has fostered an 
appetite that eats into the soul as a canker. Both as a sanitary regimen and a 
spiritual auxiliary, abstinence is commended to universal Christian adoption by the 
conjoint statute and experience of the Nazarites. [Concerning Nazarites and 
Nazaritism, see Notes on Judg. xiii. 5, 7; Lam. iv. 7; Amos ii. II, 12; Luke 
i- I5-] 

Chapter IX. Verse ii. 

The fourteenth day of the second month at even they shall keep 
it, and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. 



With unleavened bread and bitter herbs] Hebrew, al-matzoth um'rorim, 
' with unfermented-cakes and bitter-herbs.' 



Chapter XIII. Verses 17, 20. 

17 And Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan. 
(Now the time was the time of the first-ripe grapes.) 



V. 20. First-ripe grapes] Hebrew, bikurai anahvim, 'the firstfruits of 
grape-clusters.' The Lxx. has prodromoi staphulees, 'the forerunners of the 
grape.' The V. gives quando jam prcecoquce uv<z vesci possunt, 'when now the 
premature (= earliest) grapes may be eaten.' This season was early in August. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 23. 

And they came unto the brook of Eshcol, and cut down from 
tnence a branch with one cluster of grapes, and they bare it between 
two upon a staff; and they brought of the pomegranates, and of the 
figs. _____ 

The brook of Eshcol] Hebrew, nakhal eshkol. The marginal rendering 
in the A. V. is 'valley,' and the exact meaning of nakhal in this passage is 
doubtful, since nakhal, though undoubtedly signifying a stream or torrent, was 
applied to a watercourse which in summer would be perfectly dry. The 
Lxx. has heds pharangos botruos, ' to the ravine of a grape-cluster ' ; but the 
V. (with which most of the ancient versions agree) gives ad torrentem botri, ' to 
the torrent of a grape-cluster.' It will be observed that the A. V. differs from the 
Lxx. and V. in treating the Hebrew eshkol as a proper name ; and as the district 
was the same as that where Abraham dwelt with Mamre, Eshcol, and Aner 
(Gen. xiv. 13), it is not improbable that the Israelites were accidentally reviving 
the name it had formerly borne. 

A branch with one cluster of grapes] Hebrew, zemorah ve-eshkol anahv- 
im akJmd, 'a branch (= vine-branch), even a stalk of grape-clusters.' [As to 
Eshkol, see Note on Gen. xl. 10.] On this branch grew one immense bunch of 



46 NUMBERS, XVIII. 12. 

grapes, so heavy that it required to be suspended on a staff and carried by two 
men. Clusters weighing from twenty to forty pounds and upwards are still seen 
in various parts of Syria.* The Lxx. has kleema kai botrun staphulees hena epautou, 
'a branch, and one bunch of grapes with it.' The V. reads, palmitem cum uva 
sua, 'a. young branch with its own grape.' 



Chapter XIII. Verse 24. 
The place was called the brook Eshcol, because of the cluster of 
grapes which the children of Israel cut down from thence. 



So famous a grape-producing district might well receive an appropriate descrip- 
tion. [See Note on xiii. 23.] The T. of Jonathan adds that wine (khamrah) ran 
from the branch as a torrent ! Jonathan, however, does not go so far as some 
modern rabbins, and affirm that the wine was fermented ! 



Chapter XV. Verses 5, 7, 10. 
s And the fourth part of an hin of wine for a drink-offering shalt 
thou prepare with the burnt-offering or sacrifice, for one lamb. . . . 
7 And for a drink-offering thou shalt offer the third part of an hin of 
wine, for a sweet savor unto the Lord. . . . 10 And thou shalt 
bring for a drink-offering half an hin of wine, for an offering made by 
fire, of a sweet savor unto the Lord. 



See Note on Exod. xxix. 40. In each verse the Hebrew for ' wine ' is yayin ; 
the Lxx. has oinos, and the V. vinum. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 14. 
Moreover thou hast not brought us into a land that floweth with 
milk and honey, or given us inheritance of fields and vineyards : 
wilt thou put out the eyes of these men ? we will not come up. 



And vineyards] Hebrew, vah-kahrem, ' and a vineyard. 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 12. 
All the best of the oil, and all the best of the wine, and of the 
wheat, the firstfruits of them which they shall offer unto the Lord, them 
have I given thee. 

* " The grapes themselves must have been very large, if any inference can be drawn from the 
size of those which modern travelers have observed in the country. Nau affirms (p. 458) that he 
saw, in the neighborhood of Hebron, grapes as large as one's thumb. Dandini, although an 
Italian, was astonished at the large size to which grapes attained in Lebanon, being, he says 
(p. 79), as large as prunes. Mariti (3, 134) affirms that in different parts of Syria he had seen 
grapes of such extraordinary size that a bunch of them would be a sufficient burden for one man. 
Neitchutz states he could say with truth that in the mountains of Israel he saw, and had eaten from, 
bunches of grapes that were half an ell long, and the grapes two joints of a finger in length. Even 
in our own country a bunch of Syrian grapes was, some years ago, produced at Welbeck, and sent 
as a present from the Duke of Portland to the Marquis of Rockingham, which weighed nineteen 
pounds. It was conveyed to its destination — more than twenty miles distant — on a staff by four 
laborers, two of whom bore it in rotation: thus affording a striking illustration of the proceeding 
of the Israelites. The greatest diameter of this cluster was nineteen inches and a half, its circum- 
ference four feet and a half, and its length nearly twenty-three inches."— Tirosh Lo Yayin 
(1841). • 



NUMBERS, XVIII. 27, 30. 47 

And all the best of the wine] Hebrew, ve-kahl khalev tirosh, * and all the 
best (or choice part) of the vine-fruit.' Tirosh is here again grouped with yitzhar 
(olive and orchard fruit), and with dahgan (corn of all kinds), the trio forming an 
ascending scale — yitzhar, tirosh, dahgan — of the most valuable natural products of 
the ' goodly land. ' If any uncertainty existed as to these terms denoting the fruits 
of the soil in their solid state, it would be removed by the expression ' the first- 
fruits ' (rashithim), and by the language of verse 13, "Whatsoever is first ripe in 
the land, which they shall bring unto the Lord, shall be thine : every one that is 
clean in thine house shall eat of it." The Lxx. has kai pasa aparchee elaiou, kai 
pasa aparchee oinou, sitou, 'and all the firsts of oil, and all the firsts of wine, of 
corn.' The V. gives omnem medullam olei, et vini, ac frumenti, 'and all the 
choice part of oil, of wine, and of corn.' The Samaritan Version, instead of 'all the 
best of wine and corn,' has the strange reading of 'every liquor of dry or old.' 
The T. of Onkelos for tirosh has khamar. Jonathan gives ' every good of the 
wine of the grape ' — khamar inbah. In Walton's Polyglot translation tirosh is 
rendered by musti, 'of unfermented wine.' With this also agrees the Arabic 
Version, which commonly translates tirosh by etzer. This is a case, as a reference 
to the original will evince, in which the Jews of the Captivity seem to have lost the 
true and certain sense of the words tirosh and yitzhar (vine and orchard fruit), and 
to have narrowed their meaning down to that of a liquid prepared by man, and at 
the same time to have confused tirosh with a species of yayin (as ahsis or khhner), 
and yitzhar with shernen, the conventional and specific word for oil. [See Prel. 
Dis. ] The modern versions all follow in the traditional rut. 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 27. 

And this your heave-offering shall be reckoned unto you as though 
it were the corn of the threshing-floor, and as the fullness of the wine- 
press. 

And as the fullness of the winepress] Hebrew, ve-kamlaah min-hay- 
yahqev, 'and like the abundance of the vine-vat.' Yahqev, as the vat or reservoir 
into which the juice flowed, is distinguished by some critics from gath, the recep- 
tacle of the grapes, where they were trodden, = the wine-press ; but the soundness 
of this distinction is doubtful. The Lxx. has aphairema apo leenou, ' and produce 
from the wine-press.' In the V. the whole sentence runs — Ut reputetur vobis in 
oblationem primitivomm tarn de areis quam de torcularibus, ' that it may be reckoned 
to you as an oblation of firstfruits, as well from the threshing-floors as from the wine- 
presses.' Ts. Onkelos and Jonathan have 'wine of fullness from the wine-press.' 
The Arabic Version has 'the expressed juice {etzer) from the wine-press.' 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 30. 

Therefore thou shalt say unto them, When ye have heaved the best 
thereof from it, then it shall be counted unto the Levites as the in- 
crease of the threshing-floor, and as the increase of the wine-press. 



And as the increase of the wine-press] Hebrew, ve-kithvauth yahqev, 
'and as the produce of the wine-vat.' The Lxx. reads, hos geneema apo leenou, 



48 NUMBERS, XXL 1 6 — 1 8, 22. 

'and as produce from the wine-press.' The Aldine edition of the Lxx. has a 
phaire?7ia apo leenou, ' produce of the press.' The V. rendering is quasi de area et 
torculari dederitis primitias, ' as if yielding the firsts of the floor and the wine-press.' 
Onkelos gives 'as fruit of the wine-press.' 



Chapter XX. Verse 5. 
And wherefore have ye made us to come up out of Egypt, to bring 
us in unto this evil place ? it is no place of seed, or of figs, or of vines, 
or of pomegranates; neither is there any water to drink. 



Or vines] Hebrew, ve-gephen, 'and vine.' This makes it clear that the Israel- 
ites were accustomed to see, and probably to eat, the fruit of the vine, in Egypt. 
In regard to liquids, it is not the absence of wine of which they complain, but the 
want of water, and to supply this real necessity the miracle of the smitten rock is 
performed (verse 11). 

Chapter XX. Verse 17. 
Let us pass, I pray thee, through thy country; we will not pass 
through the fields, or through the vineyards, neither will we drink of 
the water of the wells : we will go by the king's high way, we will not 
turn to the right hand, nor to the left, until we have passed thy 
borders. 



Or through the vineyards] Hebrew, uv-kerem, 'and through (or into) a 
vineyard,' = land set with vines and fruit-trees. 



Chapter XXL Verses 16 — 18. 
16 And from thence they went to Beer: that is the well whereof the 
Lord spake unto Moses, Gather the people together, and I will give 
them water. 17 Then Israel sang this song, Spring up, O well ; sing 
ye unto it : 18 The princes digged the well, the nobles of the people 
digged it, by the direction 4/" the lawgiver, with their staves. 



To Beer] Beer (or Baar) signifies ' well,' an etymology which throws light 
upon this passage. The Song of the Tribes is a beautiful tribute to the priceless 
value of water, an element most appreciated in 'a dry and thirsty land,' where 
running streams are absent. How strange that ' a good creature of God ' like this 
should be despised by those who bestow the title emphatically on the products of 
misapplied ingenuity ! — and, stranger still, that they should regard this preference 
and characterization as a mark of superior wisdom ! 



Chapter XXI. Verse 22. 
Let me pass through thy land : we will not turn into the fields, or 
into the vineyards; we will not drink of the waters of the well: but 
we will go along by the king's high way, until we be past thy borders. 



Or into the vineyards] Hebrew, uv-kerem, ' and into (or through) a vine- 
yard. ' 



NUMBERS, XXVIII. 7, 1 4. 49 

Chapter XXI. Verse 29. 

Woe to thee, Moab! thou art undone, O people of Chemosh: he 
hath given his sons that escaped, and his daughters, into captivity 
unto Sihon king of the Amorites. 



Chemosh] Hebrew, Kemosh. "Some," says Rosenmiiller, "think this the 
same with the Greek Comus, the god of feasting (or guzzling), drinking, and all 
lasciviousness and wantonness. Others think the word the same with kemus, the 
Arabic for 'lice,' and that it was the image of one made with astrologic art to 
extirpate lice. So the Acaronites worshipped Baal-zebul, 'the fly god.'" Gesenius 
considers it to signify 'subduer,' 'conqueror.' 



Chapter XXII. Verse 24. 
But the angel of the Lord stood in a path of the vineyards, a wall 



being on this side, and a wall on that side. 



In a path of the vineyards] Hebrew, be-mishol kak'ramim, ' in a narrow 
path of the vineyards/ — a road running through a district set with vines. These 
paths were exceedingly narrow, and sometimes flanked, as in this case, with walls 
made of the stones taken from the land. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 7. 
And the drink-offering thereof shall be the fourth part of an hin for 
the one lamb : in the holy place shalt thou cause the strong wine to 
be poured unto the Lord for a drink-offering. 



Drink-offering] Hebrew, nesek, 'a libation,' = that which is poured out. 

An hin] Hebrew, hin. See Note on Exod. xxix. 40. 

The strong wine] Hebrew, shakar, 'sweet drink.' The Lxx. has sikera ; 
the V. vini, 'of wine.' The T. of Onkelos has 'a libation of old wine' (dakha- 
mar attiq). The Jerusalem T. renders khamar bekhir, 'a choice wine.' Jonathan 
agrees with Onkelos, but adds, " If old wine cannot be found, let wine of forty days 
be poured out before the Lord." This is the only place where the A. V. gives to 
shakar the rendering of ' strong wine 1 ; probably to make the passage agree with 
verse 14, and with Exod, xxix. 40, where wine (yayiri) alone is mentioned. 
Shakar may here be taken in its most comprehensive sense, as including all sweet 
drinks, even yayin in its sweet condition; or the injunction may be read as a per- 
mission to use either shakar ox yayin, as might be most convenient. [See Note on 
Cant. viii. 2.] 

It is not necessary to quote at length the other passages in this chapter where 
the word nesek, 'drink-offering,' or better, 'libation,' occurs. A reference will 
suffice to verses 9, 10, 14, 15, 24, 31. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 14. 
And their drink-offerings shall be half an hin of wine unto a bul- 
lock, and the third part of an hin unto a ram, and a fourth part of an 



50 NUMBERS, XXXII. 9. 



hin unto a lamb : this is the burnt-offering of every month through- 
out the months of the year. 



Of wine] Hebrew, yayin, 'wine'; the Lxx. oinou, and V. vini, 'of wine.' 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 17. 
And in the fifteenth day of this month is the feast : seven days shall 
unleavened bread be eaten. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, ' unfermented-cakes ' ; the Lxx., 
azuma, ' unfermented- things ' ; the V., azymis, 'with unfermented things.' 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 9. 
For when they went up unto the valley of Eschol, and saw the land, 
they discouraged the heart of the children of Israel, that they should 
not go into the land which the Lord had given them. 



Unto the valley of Eshcol] Hebrew, ad nahkal Eshkol, ' to the valley of 
Eshcol.' [See Note on Numb. xiii. 23.] 



THE BOOK OF DEUTERONOMY, 



Chapter I. Verse 24. 

And they turned and went up into the mountain, and came unto 
the valley of Eshcol, and searched it out. 



The valley of Eshcol] See Notes on Numb. xiii. 23, 24. 



Chapter II. Verse 6. 



Ye shall buy meat of them for money, that ye may eat ; and ye 
shall also buy water of them for money, that ye may drink. 



The value attached to water in the East is here brought strikingly before us ; 
also the justice which characterized the policy of the Jewish lawgiver. The Edom- 
ites were in possession of the wells, and the fluid of life must be paid for, if money 
would be accepted. 



Chapter VI. Verse ii. 



And houses full of all good things, which thou filledst not, and 
wells digged, which thou diggedst not, vineyards and olive trees, 
which thou plantedst not ; when thou shalt have eaten and be full. 



Vineyards] Hebrew, kerahmim, 'vineyards.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 13. 

And he will love thee, and bless thee, and multiply thee : he will 
also bless the fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy land, thy corn, 
and thy wine, and thine oil, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of 
thy sheep, in the land which he sware unto thy fathers to give thee. 



And the fruit of thy land] Hebrew, u-phri admahthekah, ' and the fruit of 
thy soil.' Peri, 'fruit,' is derived from pahrah, 'to bear,' and is here used com- 
prehensively of the three principal productions of the Holy Land, dahgan, tirosh, 
yitzhar — corn, vine-fruit, and orchard-fruit. 

Thy wine] The Hebrew is ve-tiroshkah, 'and thy vine-fruit.' Onkelos has 
v'kamrak, 'and thy wine'; the Lxx., ton oinou sou, 'of thy wine.' So the 



52 DEUTERONOMY, XL 1 4. 

Syriac. The Arabic has 'thy expressed juice.' TheV., atque vindemice, 'and of 
(thy) vintage ' — showing that St Jerome recognized the solid character of the sub- 
stance denoted by tiros h. We have here the advantage of consulting a fragment 
of the Greek version of Aquila, which was held in high repute for its literal ren- 
derings. He gives oporismon sou, 'thy autumnal fruit,' = the vine-fruit in its 
maturity. This agrees with the various senses of 'to occupy,' or 'possess,' or 'to 
expel,' borne by y 'a hrash (the root of tirosk). 



Chapter VII. Verse 25. 
The graven images of their gods shall ye burn with fire : thou shalt 
not desire the silver or gold that is on them, nor take it unto thee, 
lest thou be snared therein : for it is an abomination to the Lord thy 
God. 



The sin of idolatry was so heinous, and the danger of incurring it so great, that 
not only were the objects of heathen worship to be burnt, but the idol ornaments 
were to perish with them, lest their possession should be a snare. This command 
clearly embodies the principle, that things intrinsically harmless, and even useful, 
are to be put away when their association with things evil has made them a source 
of moral peril. What intelligent reader can fail to discern the force with which 
this principle applies, not only to the use of strong. drinks, but also to every custom 
encouraging their use ? Not merely should the alcoholic idols of Britain be for- 
saken, but whatever tends to popularize and recommend them is to be studiously 
renounced. 



Chapter VIII. Verses 7, 8. 
7 For the Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land, a land of 
brooks of water, of fountains and^ depths that spring out of valleys 
and hills ; 8 A land of wheat, and Parley, and vines, and fig-trees, and 
pomegranates ; a land of oil olive, and honey. 



V. 8. And vines] Hebrew, ve-gephen, ' and the vine.' 

And honey] Hebrew, u-d'vash, 'and honey.' 

The profusion of water in Canaan, supplied by rain, springs, and watercourses, 
formed a striking contrast with the state of Egypt, where rain seldom fell, and 
where the almost exclusive water supply was derived from the river Nile. 



Chapter XL Verse 14. 
That I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the 
first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and 
thy wine, and thine oil. 

That thou mayest gather in] Hebrew, ve-ahsaphtah, from ahsaph, ' to scrape 
together,' pointing to the collecting of the solid fruits of the earth. 

And thy wine] Hebrew, ve-tiroshkah, ' and thy vine-fruit. ' The Lxx. gives 
kai ton oinon sou, 'and thy wine ' ; the V. et vinum, 'and wine.' The Targum 
of Onkelos has tf khamrah, ' and thy wine ' ; Jonathan's, khamraidon, ' your wines.' 
The Syriac has 'wine,' and the Arabic ' expressed juice ' (etzer). 



DEUTERONOMY, XIV. 23, 26. 53 

Chapter XII. Verse 17. 
Thou mayest not eat within thy gates the tithe of thy corn, or of 
thy wine, or of thy oil, or the firstlings of thy herds or of thy flock, 
nor any of thy vows which thou vowest, nor thy freewill offerings, or 
heave-offering of thine hand. 



Again we have tiros h as the second member of the triad (corn, vine-fruit, and 
orchard-fruit). The Lxx. keeps to oinon ; the V. returns to vinttm. Walton's 
Polyglot Version gives, as usual, mustum (new, unfermented wine) as the Latin 
equivalent of the Hebrew and Hebrew-Samaritan text; and with this the Arabic 
Version agrees {etzer). The word 'eat' {ahkal), applied to the natural triad, 
confirms the theory of their solid character ; for though we may speak of ' eating ' 
a meal of which liquids form an unnamed part, we should never speak of ' eating ' 
three things, only one of which was a solid. Even ' eating ' toast-and- water would 
be an absurd phrase. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 23. 
And thou shalt eat before the Lord thy God, in the place which 
he shall choose to place his name there, the tithe of thy corn, of thy 
wine, and of thine oil, and the firstlings of thy herds and of thy flocks ; 
that thou mayest learn to fear the Lord thy God always. 



The triad here recurs, and tirosh again occupies the second place. The Lxx. 
repeats its oinon, which anciently, however, had a wider sense than mere fluid wine. 
(See Note on Jer. xl. 10, 12.) The V. follows with its vinum. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 26. 
And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever . thy soul lusteth 
after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for 
whatsoever thy soul desireth : and thou shalt eat there before the Lord 
thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou, and thine household. 



Or for wine or for strong drink] Hebrew, u-vay-yayin, u-vash-shakar, 
'and for wine, and for sweet drink' ; the Lxx., ee epi oino, ee epi sikera, 'or for 
wine, or for sicera.'' The V. has vinum guoque et siceram, 'wine also and sicera.'' 
The Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan read, uba-khamar khadath v'attiq, 'for 
wine, new and old.' The Syriac has 'for wine and sicera.'' The Arabic has ' for 
wine and expressed juice ' {etzer). Aquila's rendering of shakar is the only part 
of the verse preserved — methusmati, which some render ' for an intoxicating drink '; 
but he may have used methusma in the strict and original sense of its root metktio, 
'to drink largely of what is sweet.' [On Shakar, see Prel. Dis., and Note on 
Lev. x. 8—15.] 

And thou shalt eat them] Hebrew, ve-akaltak, 'and thou shalt eat.' 
' Them ' is supplied by the English translators, being absent from the text, which 
reads, ' and thou shalt eat there.' The V. has simply ' and thou shalt eat.' 



Devout Israelites with their families going up from a distance to the House of 
God would find it burdensome or impossible to take with them in substance the 



54 DEUTERONOMY, XIV. 26. 

tithes of the corn-field, the vineyard, and the orchard, and the firstlings of herd and 
fold. They were, therefore, permitted to convert these tithes into money, and on 
their arrival at the sacred capital to purchase with this money things corresponding 
to those they could not conveniently convey from their homes. Instead of tirosh and 
yitzhar, they might buy yayin (the juice of tirosh) and shakar (the juice of other 
fruits), or 'whatever their soul lusted after' (z. e. if desired in a good, not in an 
evil sense, for this is here the meaning of avah), or whatever their soul 'desired,' 
— literally, ' asked from itself,' which is the marginal reading.* This comprehen- 
sive permission was implicitly limited by two conditions, — 1st, that the things so 
purchased were good in themselves; 2d, that they were not prohibited by the 
Levitical law. It has been held by some that this regulation sanctioned the use of 
intoxicating drinks ; but, — 

(1) Nothing is said of the inebriating quality of the drinks named; and the 
permission would have been fully observed by the use of unfermented yayin and 
shakar. 

(2) It is true that the purchase and consumption of fermented yayin and shakar 
are not prohibited; but, on the other hand, nothing is said against buying and 
drinking them in an impure and drugged condition. It may surely be presumed 
that the divine intention had respect to these liquids in their most innocent and 
well-known nutritious state ; and any departure from the spirit of this arrangement 
— any abuse of the privilege — could not be chargeable on the Supreme Lawgiver, 
but on the people themselves. 

(3) The question why the use of intoxicating liquors was permitted, opens up 
another and distinct line of inquiry, and is similar to many other questions ; such 
as why polygamy, facility of divorce, slavery, etc., were allowed, and even made 
the subjects of positive legislation. The words of the Lord (Matt. v. 31, 32; 
xix. 7, 8) supply the general answer. The evil ' suffered ' was not sanctioned, 
'commanded,' or blessed by God; and in regard to intoxicating drinks, intimations 
were frequently given, by example and precept, from which the discerning might 
profit, making clear the physical and moral benefits to be secured by abstinence. 

(4) The vulgar notion that this verse embodies a divine prescription to the 
Israelites to drink freely of intoxicating liquors, along with their households, till 
their money was expended, though often faithfully carried out, is a dangerous 
handling of the word of God. Such an interpretation, acted upon by the Jews, 
must have converted these festivals into scenes of debauch. No man of ordinary 
prudence and benevolence would now issue such an unguarded order. Who can 
picture, without a strong moral revulsion, fathers, mothers, and children, of both 
sexes and all ages, 'rejoicing' together over flagons of intoxicating fluids? The 
Athenians eulogized Amphictyon, one of their kings who raised an altar to the 
Upright Bacchus, because he taught them to mix their wine with water, and thus 
diminished the vice of drunkenness ; but it is reserved for the modern advocates 
of alcoholic liquor to affix to a merciful regulation, designed for the comfort of 
pious Jews, a meaning which, if carried out, must have resulted in wide-spread 
dissipation and demoralization, converting a sacred feast into a sottish revel. It 

*On this text Calvin observes: — "A certain sect of heretics, called Manichees, that scorned God's 
law and the prophets, alleged this present text (Deut. xiv. 26), and similar ones, to show that the God 
of the Old Testament, as they blasphemously termed Him, was a God of disorder, and such a one as 
kept no good rule. For, said they. He laid the bridle upon His people's neck, and bade them eat 
whatsoever they liked, and so His intention was to make them drunkards and gluttons, by encourag- 
ing them to eat and drink after that fashion. 

" It is a foul shame to allege this text as a placard for the setting of all lusts at liberty. The words 
liking, longing, or listing, ought rather to be restrained to the things that are lawful, and which God 
had given them leave to deal with." — Sermons on Deuteronomy. 



DEUTERONOMY, XVI. 3, 4, 8, 1 3. 55 

is possible that the permission was abused by some sensual or thoughtless persons 
(as in later ages was the case with the feast of Ptirim, or lots); but they could not 
plead that any abuse arose naturally and directly out of a compliance with the spirit 
or letter of the law. If they used ' wine and strong drink ' like that which after- 
ward made priests and prophets to err, the blunder and blame were theirs, and 
theirs alone. 

Chapter XV. Verse 14. 
Thou shalt furnish him liberally out of thy flock, and out of thy 
floor, and out of thy winepress : of that wherewith the Lord thy God 
hath blessed thee thou shalt give unto him. 



And out of thy winepress] The Hebrew is u-miy-yiqbekah, ' and from thy 
winepress ' (or vat). Cod. A of the Lxx. has apo tees leenou sou, ' from thy 
press'; but Cod. B reads, apo tou oinou sou, ' from thy wine. ' The Arabic has 
' from thy expressed juice ' {etzer). The V. has et torculari tuo, ' and from thy 
press.' The spirit of this command was 'Freely ye have received, freely give.' 



Chapter XVI. Verse 3. 
Thou shalt eat no leavened bread with it; seven days shalt thou 
eat unleavened bread therewith, even the bread of affliction (for thou 
earnest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste) ; that thou mayest 
remember the day when thou earnest forth out of the land of Egypt 
all the days of thy life. 

Leavened bread] Hebrew, khamatz, literally, 'fermented thing.' The Lxx. 
has zumeen, 'ferment'; the V. panem fermentatum, ' bread fermented. ' 

Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, 'unfermented cakes.' The Lxx. has 
azuma, 'unleavened things ' ; the V., comedes absque fermento, ' thou shalt eat with- 
out a ferment' 

Chapter XVI. Verse 4, first clause. 
And there shall be no leavened bread seen with thee in all thy 
coast seven days. 



Leavened bread] Hebrew, seor, 'ferment' (or leaven); the Lxx., zumee, 
ferment'; the V.,/ermen turn, 'ferment.' 



Chapter XVI. Verse 8. 
Six days thou shalt eat unleavened bread: and on the seventh day 
shall be a solemn assembly to the Lord thy God : thou shalt do no 
work therein. 

Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, ' fresh ' or ' unfermented cakes ' ; the 
Lxx. and V., azuma, 'unfermented things.' 



Chapter XVI. Verse 13. 
Thou shalt observe the feast of tabernacles seven days, after that 
thou hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine. 



56 DEUTERONOMY, XX. 6, 1 9, 20. 

After that thou hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine] The 
Hebrew is be-ahspekah mig-garnekah u-miy-yiqvekah, "in thy gathering from thy 
level [threshing] floor, and from thy hollow place " [where grapes are trodden]. 
The Lxx. has en to sunagagein se ek tou halonos sou kai apo tees leenou sou, "in 
thy gathering from thy threshing-floor, and from thy press;" the V., quando 
collegeris de area et torculari fruges tuas, "when thou shalt gather thy fruits from 
the floor and the press. 

Chapter XVI. Verse 16. 
Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the Lord 
thy God in the place which he shall choose : in the feast of unleavened 
bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles : and 
they shall not appear before the Lord empty. 



In the feast of unleavened bread] Hebrew, be-khag ham-matzoth, 'in the 
feast of the unfermented-cakes.' The Lxx. reads ton azumon, the V. azymorum, 
* of unfermented things.' 

Chapter XVIII. Verse 4. 
The nrstfruit also of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the 
first of the fleece of thy sheep, shalt thou give him. 



Of THY wine] Hebrew, tirosk-kah, 'thy vine-fruit.' The triad is here re- 
peated, — corn, vine-fruit, orchard-fruit. The Lxx. has sitou, oinoti, elaiou, 'of 
corn, wine, oil'; the Y.,frumenti, vini, olei, 'of corn, wine, oil.' 



Chapter XX. Verse 6. 
And what man is he that hath planted a vineyard, and hath not yet 
eaten of it ? let him also go and return unto his house, lest he die in 
the battle, and another man eat of it. 



A vineyard] Hebrew, herein ; Lxx. ampelona ; V., vineam. 
And hath not yet eaten of it] Hebrew, ve-lo khellolo, ' and has not appro- 
priated it' (for common purposes). 



Chapter XX. Verses 19, 20. 
19 When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against 
it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an axe 
against them : for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut 
them down (for the tree of the field is man's life) to employ the??i in 
the siege : 20 Only the trees which thou knowest that they be not trees 
for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down. 



Our interpretation of the primeval law of food is strongly confirmed by this 
passage, and the essential wickedness of destroying the sources of human sustenance 
and comfort. The idea is that the tree which God planted is for all the children 
of men who pass by or dwell near, and need its fruit for food — a permanent supply, 



DEUTERONOMY, XXL 20, 21. 57 

which no temporary exigency must be suffered to destroy. The Mohammedans to 
this day observe this law ; and a curious story is related of the Arabian prophet, 
that when on one occasion in the siege of a fortress, prolonged by the access of the 
besieged during night to the date palms outside its walls, he ordered some of his 
personal followers secretly to cut down these palm trees, his soldiers next morning 
remonstrated, so that Mohammed had to invent a special commission for the work, 
which, however, he never afterwards repeated. 



Chapter XXI. Verses 20, 21. 
20 And they shall say unto the elders of his city, This our son is 
stubborn and rebellious ; he will not obey our voice ; he is a glutton, 
and a drunkard. 21 And all the men of his city shall stone him with 
stones, that he die: so shalt thou put evil away from among you; 
and all Israel shall hear, and fear. 



A glutton, and A drunkard] The Hebrew is zolal ve-sova, ' a profligate and 
toper.' Zolal is from zaklal, ' to shake,' 'to shake out ' ; hence one who lavishes 
and wastes what should be husbanded with care. Sova, from sah-vah, ' to suck up, ' 
signifies one who soaks or topes. Though the drink (sobeh) would not be neces- 
sarily intoxicating, dissolute men might be expected to prefer such kinds of sobeh 
as would stimulate their baser nature. The Lxx. has sumbolokopon oinophlugei, 
' frequenting feasts he is wine-flooded ' ; but in Codex B the copyist first wrote 
oinophrugei, * wine-parched. ' The V. reads, commissationibus vocat, et luxuries, 
atque conviviis, 'he devotes himself to parties, and to luxury, and to feasts.' 
Onkelos and Jonathan give ' he is a devourer of flesh and a bibber of wine.' Aquila 
has sumposiazei, 'he goes drinking with others.' TheSyriachas ' he is immoderate 
and drunken ' ; the Arabic, ' he is intemperate and devoted to illicit courses.' Dr 
Gill notes that " according to the Misnah a glutton and a drunkard is one that 
eats half a pound of flesh and drinks half a log of Italian wine — a quarter of a pint, 
— which would be at this day reckoned very little by our grandsons of Bacchus, as 
Schickard observes, but in an age of severer discipline, in the tender candidates of 
temperance it was reckoned too much. The Jews seem to refer to this when they 
charged Christ with being a glutton and a winebibber." 



The laws of some ancient nations — as, for example, the Romans — gave to the 
father the power of life and death over his children; but the Mosaic law, as 
detailed above and in verses 18 and 19, gave the parent the right of simply subject- 
ing a reprobate son to trial for a capital offense, after all ordinary plans of reclama- 
tion had been tried in vain. As to this law — designed to prevent dishonor to 
parents and the spread of dissoluteness in society — we have no means of knowing 
whether it was often, or even ever, enforced. Its operation would certainly be 
restricted to extreme cases of filial impiety and vice. Matthew Henry's note on 
verses 20 and 21 is instructive : — " He (the impious son) is particularly supposed 
to be a glutton or a drunkard. This intimates either (1) that his parents did in a 
particular manner warn him against these sins, and therefore in these instances there 
was plain evidence he did not obey their voice. Lemuel had this charge from his 
mother, Prov. xxxi. 4. Note, in the education of children great care should be taken 
to suppress all inclinations to drunkenness, and to keep them out of the way of 
temptations to them ; in order hereunto they should be possessed betimes with a 
8 



58 DEUTERONOMY, XXII. 4, 8, 9. 

dread and detestation of these beastly sins, and taught betimes to deny themselves. 
Or (2) that being a glutton and a drunkard was the cause of his insolence and 
obstinacy to his parents. Note, nothing draws men into all manner of wickedness, 
and hardens them to it, more certainly and fatally than drunkenness does. When 
men take to drink they forget the law (Prov. xxxi. 5), even that fundamental law 
of honoring parents." As Keil and Delitzsch remark, "those last accusations 
show the reason for the unmanageableness and refractoriness." 



Chapter XXII. Verse 4. 
Thou shalt not see thy brother's ass or his ox fall down by the way, 
and hide thyself from them : thou shalt surely help him to lift them up 
again. 

A truly benevolent ordinance ; and a man is better (by how much who can cal- 
culate?) than an ass or ox. Even to help a brother to regain the services of his 
beasts is a small thing compared with helping him to regain his health and good 
name — perhaps his very soul ; and whoever helps the Temperance reformation is 
thus assisting to rescue thousands fallen by the way, and ready to perish. 



Chapter XXII. Verse 8. 
When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a battle- 
ment for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any 
man fall from thence. 



The battlement was to be erected, not because any person was sure to fall over 
an unparapetted roof, but in order that the danger of this misfortune should be 
averted. It was a provision against a form of accident that would otherwise have 
been possible to all, probable to many, though absolutely certain to none. Such a 
personal, domestic, and social battlement is the Temperance rule (of which ' the 
pledge ' is the simple definition and verbal expression), and in the complete 
security it imparts against the disease, vice, sin, and crime of intemperance lies its 
incomparable excellence over every other substitute proposed by the wit of man. 



Chapter XXII. Verse 9. 
Thou shalt not sow thy vineyard with divers seeds : lest the fruit 
of thy seed which thou hast sown, and the fruit of thy vineyard, be 
defiled. 



Thy vineyard] Hebrew, karmekah, ' thy cultivated plot.' 

With divers seeds] Hebrew, kilaim, 'two separated things,' two things of 
diverse sorts. 

The fruit of thy seed] Hebrew, hamlaah kaz-zera, 'the fulness of the 
seed.' 



That kerem is employed in this passage to designate any distinct portion of cul- 
tivated land is apparent from the context. One kind of plant or grain, and one 
only, was to grow in each kerem, — a prohibition designed to act as a practical 
parable — a sermon in seeds — towards dissuading the Jewish people from those 
adulterous connections that would expose them to the divine displeasure. 



DEUTERONOMY, XXVIII. 30, 39. 59 

Chapter XXIII. Verse 24. 

When thou comest into thy neighbor's vineyard, then thou mayest 
eat grapes thy fill at thine own pleasure ; but thou shalt not put any 
in thy vessel. 



Grapes] Hebrew, anahvim, 'grape-clusters. 



The common road often passed through a vineyard or corn-field, and it was mer- 
cifully permitted to the wayfarer that he might pluck and eat of the hanging cluster 
or heavy ear of corn; while, to guard against serious loss to the owner, a sickle for 
cutting, and a 'vessel ' (keli) for carrying away, the fruit of the field, were expressly 
disallowed. Nevertheless the claim of present and pressing hunger to relief was 
acknowledged. 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 21. 

When thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not 
glean it afterward : it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, and 
for the widow. 



When thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard] Hebrew, ki thivtzor 
karmekak, 'when thou cuttest off thy vineyard,' referring to the custom of cutting 
away the grapes from the vines and placing them in baskets at the time of vintage. 



The benignity of this provision is upon the surface. After a proprietor had cut 
off such clusters as he thought fit to take away, any he had allowed to remain, or 
had overlooked, instead of being gleaned by him or his servants, were to be reserved 
for the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow. To ' remember the poor ' was a 
lesson legibly inscribed upon the Mosaic economy, though Christianity has given to 
it a breadth and depth of application unknown before. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 30, last clause. 
Thou shalt plant a vineyard, and shalt not gather the grapes thereof. 



A vineyard] Hebrew, kerem ; Lxx., ampelona; V., vineam. The 'grapes' 
are words interpolated by the English translators, the literal rendering being, "A 
vineyard thou shalt plant, and shall not appropriate it," i. e. use its produce. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 39. 

Thou shalt plant vineyards, and dress them, but shalt neither drink 
of the wine, nor gather the grapes ; for the worms shall eat them. 



Vineyards] Hebrew, kerahmim, 'vineyards.' The Lxx. has ampelona, the V. 
vineam, both signifying ' a vineyard. ' 

But shalt neither drink of the wine] Hebrew, ve-yayin lo thishteh, ' and 
the yayin thou shalt not drink.' The Lxx. reads kai oinon ou piesai, the V. et 
vinum nan bibes, ' and wine thou shalt not drink.' 



60 DEUTERONOMY, XXIX. 6, 1 9. 

Nor gather the grapes] Hebrew, ve-lo t/ieegor, ' and shalt not gather.' The 
A. V. supplies the word 'grapes,' but the construction shows that 'it,' i. e. yayin, 
ought to have been the word employed to complete the translation. By an easy 
figure, as some suppose, the expressed juice (yayhi) is put for the vine-fruit itself; 
if, indeed, it had not originally that inclusive literal sense, like Cato's vinum, or 
the command of Gedaliah, ' Gather ye yayin ' (Jer. xl. 10) ; so alien from the Hebrew 
mind was the modern notion that grape-juice should not be called yayin until fer- 
mented ! The Lxx. offers a different reading, oude enphrantlieesee ex atitou, ' nor be 
gladdened by it,' i. e. the wine (oi?ion). The V. has nee collegis ex ea quippiam, 
'nor shalt thou gather aught from it,' i. e. (vinea, 'vineyard,' understood). 

For THE WORMS SHALL EAT them] Hebrew, hat-tolahath ; Lxx. skoleex ; V., 
vermibus, 'by worms.' There is a species of worms peculiarly destructive to vines, 
called by the Greeks ips or ix, and by the Romans convolvuli and voluces. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 51. 

And he shall eat the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of thy land, 
until thou be destroyed : which also shall not leave thee either corn, 
wine, or oil, or the increase of thy kine, or flocks of thy sheep, until 
he have destroyed thee. 

• The triad recurs — da/igan, tirosh, yitzhar, corn, vine-fruit, olive-and-orchard fruit. 
These products of the soil were all to be swept away by the invaders. For tirosh, 
the Targums, Lxx., and V. have, as usual, respectively, khomrah, oino?z, vinum. 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 6. 
Ye have not eaten bread, neither have ye drunk wine or strong 
drink : that ye might know that I am the Lord your God. 



Neither have ye drunk wine or strong drink] The Hebrew, ve-yayin, 
ve-shakarlo shethithem. The Lxx. reads, oinon kai sikera ouk epiete ; the V., 
vinum et siceram non bibistis. Aquila renders shakarhy methusma, ' strong drink.' 
The T. of Onkelos reads, ' wine, new and old, ye did not drink ' ; but Jonathan's 
gives 'wine and neat (undiluted wine), khamar u-marath, ye drank not.' 



From this verse we learn that during their desert journeyings of forty years the 
people, of Israel abstained from all kinds of yayin and shakar, unfermented and fer- 
mented, innocent and inebriating. Hence those ' do greatly err, not knowing the 
Scriptures,' who either deride abstinence as a novelty, or condemn it as an imprac- 
ticable or dangerous habit of life. 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 19. 
And it come to pass, when he heareth the words of this curse, that 
he bless himself in his heart, saying, I shall have peace, though I 
walk in the imagination of mine heart, to add drunkenness to thirst. 



To add] Hebrew, lemahn sepheth, 'with the intention to add,' denoting the 
reckless purpose of the sensualist. 



DEUTERONOMY, XXXII. 14. 6 1 

Drunkenness to thirst] Hebrew, hah-rahvah etk-hatz'maak, ' the drunken 
(or satiated) one with the thirsty.' So the margin of A. V. Bishop Patrick and 
others prefer 'the thirsty with the drunken.' The V. reads, absumat ebria satien- 
tem, ' the drunken may consume the thirsty ' ; but absicmat is a correction of 
assumat, 'add to,' of the earlier editions. The Lxx. makes God to interfere, 
hina mee sunapolesee ho hamartolos ton anamarteeton, " in order that the sinner 
may not destroy the non-transgressor with him." 



Taking these renderings in their order, (1) the meaning of the A. V. would be 
that the profligate designs to indulge in drink in spite of, or perhaps in order to 
allay, the thirst which previous debauches have induced, according to the proverb, 
'Ever drunk, ever dry,' and then drink afresh because of the dryness — 'I will 
seek it yet again.' (2) Of the two literal translations the first implies that the 
sinner, though drenched with liquor, would join himself to any one who was thirst- 
ing after it; the second translation, ' The thirsty with the drunken,' expresses an 
intention to connect the thirsty with the intemperate — to lead the sober astray. 
(3) The Vulgate version implies that the tippler vaunts that he shall consume all 
thirst; "or it may be referred to the root of bitterness spoken of before, which, 
being drunken with sin, may attract, and by that means consume such as thirst 
after the like evils ; " or it may refer to the seduction successfully practised by the 
evil on the good. [See the Douay Version, with Notes by Drs Haydock and 
Husenbeth. ] (4) The Lxx. differs widely from all these renderings, and, without 
any allusion to intemperance, intimates that the impious boaster should be the 
subject of Divine punishment in order to prevent him involving the innocent in his 
own destruction. The Jewish expositors give the passage a spiritual application. 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 14. 
Butter of kine, and milk of sheep, with fat of lambs, and rams of 
the breed of Bashan, and goats, with the fat of kidneys of wheat ; and 
thou didst drink the pure blood of the grape. 



And thou didst drink the pure blood of the grape] The Hebrew is 
ve-dam anahv tishtek khamer, "and the blood of the grape-cluster thou shalt 
drink — khamer (foaming)." [See Prel. Dis.] As the verb khamar signifies 
'to foam' or 'boil,' khamer, in this passage, describes the foaming appearance 
of the juice as it rushes, before fermentation, from the trodden clusters ; so the 
cognate Chaldee, khamar and hhamrah — a sense perfectly consistent with the 
application of the same word to the turbid and foaming liquor during fermentation. 
Names do not change with the deterioration of things. The Lxx. rendering is kai 
aima staphulees epien oinon, ' and blood of grape he drank — wine. ' The Com- 
plutensian Edition gives epinon, ' they drank. ' The V. is et sanguinem uvce biberet 
meracissimum, 'and he might drink the purest blood of the grape.' Aquila trans- 
lates khamer by austeeron, 'rough.' The T. of Onkelos is metaphorical — 'The 
blood of their mightiest was poured out like water ' ; that of Jonathan is hyperbolical 
" They shall draw out one kor [seventy-five gallons] of red wine {khamar sumaq) 
from one grape-cluster " ! The Jerusalem T. is more moderate — "They shall drink 
a cup (kos) of wine from one grape-cluster." 



Among the blessings of the good land that the Israelites were ' to go up and 
possess ' was the blood of the grape, which in its unfermented, uncorrupted state 



62 DEUTERONOMY, XXXII. 32, 33. 

is proved, by chemical analysis, to constitute one of the most perfect of alimentary 
substances — to be really food and drink in one, and therefore well worthy to 
rank with the "butter of kine, milk of sheep, fat of lambs, and the fat of kidneys 
of wheat." 



Chapter XXXII. Verses 32, 33. 

32 For their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the fields of 
Gomorrah : their grapes are grapes of gall, their clusters are bitter : 
33 Their wine is the poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps. 



The Hebrew reads, ki mig-gephen Sedom gaphnahm, umish-shadmoth 'Amorah; 
anahvaimo invai rosh ; ashkeloth meroroth lahmo ; khamath tanninim yaynahm. 
v* rosh pethahnim akzar: "for of the vine of Sodom (is) their vine, and of the fields 
of Gomorrah; their grape-bunches (are) grape-bunches of gall; (their) clustered- 
branches (are) bitter to them ; the inflaming-heat of serpents (is) their wine, and the 
virulent gall of vipers." The Lxx. is as follows: — ek gar ampelou Sodomon hee 
ampelos auton, kai hee kleemaits auton ek Gomotrhas. [Hee (Codex A)~\ staphulee 
auton staphulee cholees, botrus pikrias autois. Thumos drakonton ho oinos auton, 
kai thumos aspidon aniatos : "for from the vine of Sodom (is) their vine, and their 
vine-branch from Gomorrah. Their grape (is) a grape of gall, a cluster of 
bitterness theirs. Their wine (is) fierceness of dragons, and the incurable fierce- 
ness of asps." 

The versions of Symmachus and Theodotion have been lost, and all that remains 
of Aquila's are the concluding words, kai kephalee basiliskon asplanchnos — 'and 
the unpitying head of basilisks ' [a venomous species of reptile]. The V. runs 
thus : — De vinea Sodomorum vinea eorum et de suburbanis Gomorrhce ; uva eorum 
uva fellis, et botri amarissimi. Fel draconum vinum eorum et venerium aspidum 
insanabile — " Of the vineyard of Sodom is their vineyard, and of the district of 
Gomorrah; their grape (is) the grape of gall, and (their) clusters (are) most bitter. 
The gall of dragons (is) their wine, and the incurable poison of asps." All the 
Targumists give to the passage a figurative coloring. Onkelos has "even as the 
punishments of the people of Sodom will be their punishments, and their overthrow 
as (that) of the people of Gomorrah. Their torments (shall be) most grievous as 
the heads of adders, and the retribution of their works as poison. As the gall of 
dragons (shall be) the end of their revenge, and as the head of cruel asps." Jona- 
than reads, " Because the works of this people are like the works of the people of 
Sodom, and their counsels like the counsels of the people of Gomorrah — their 
thoughts are as evil as the heads of basilisks, — therefore their retribution shall be 
desolating, and with bitterness afflicting them. Behold, as the venom of serpents 
when they go forth from their wine ; such shall be the bitter cup of malediction 
which they shall drink in the day of their vengeance, and as the heads of cruel 
basilisks." The Jerusalem T. reads, "Since the works of that people are like to 
the works of the people of Sodom, and their thoughts like to the thoughts of the 
people of Gomorrah, their works shall be made desolate, and with bitterness shall 
they afflict them. Since the poison of that people is like to the poison of serpents 
in the time when they drink wine, and their wrath is like the heads of cruel 
asps." To understand the Targumists' versions we must recollect that according 
to an ancient belief serpents were very fond of wine, the drinking of which rendered 
their poison more intense. 



DEUTERONOMY, XXXII. 32, 33. 63 

V. 32. Their vine is of the vine of Sodom] The margin of the A. V. reads, 
* or worse than the vine of Sodom ' ; and the Hebrew min readily takes either the 
conjunctive sense 'of — 'their vine is of [derived from] the wine of Sodom,' — or 
the disjunctive sense 'away from' — 'their vine is away from [z. e. worse than] the 
vine of Sodom.' The former rendering seems more accordant with the succeeding 
clause, — 

And of the fields of Gomorrah] The Hebrew shedamah (plural shadmoth) 
signifies land sown or planted. The rendering of the Lxx. kleema, ' offshoot ' or 
' vine-branch,' does not well agree with the context in most other passages — 2 Kings 
xix. 16; xxiii. 4; Isa. xvi. 8; xxxvii. 27; Jer. xxxi. 40; Hab. hi. 17- 

Grapes of gall] The Hebrew rosh is translated in the Lxx. and V. by 
words denoting, specifically, 'gall,' and generically, 'poison.' Gesenius thinks it 
meant the poppy, but the connection implies some poisonous berry of a bitter 
taste. 

V. 33. Their wine is the poison of dragons] The Hebrew khamah, 'heat,' 
obtains the force of ' poison, or that which burns the bowels ' (Gesenius). See 
Notes on Psa. lviii. 5, and Hos. vii. 5. Figuratively, khamah designates ardent 
passion, such as 'rage,' 'fury,' 'wrath,' and is so applied in Gen. xxvii. 44; 
Job xxi. 20; Isa. li. 17; Jer. vi. II, and xxv. 15. Tanninim, rendered 'dragons ' 
in the A. V., signifies any very lengthy animals = monsters, and here refers to 
huge venomous reptiles common in arid countries. 

The cruel venom of asps] Hebrew, rosh pethahnim akzar. It is hard to 
say why rosh, in verse 32, should have been translated 'gall,' and in verse 33 
' venom ' ; perhaps it was in deference to the same inconsistency in the Lxx., which 
gives both cholee (gall) and thu?nos (fierceness or rage); and in the V., which has 
\>o\hfel (gall) and venerium (venom). What is more curious in authorities is (as 
the reader may see by looking back), that Aquila and the Targumists understood 
by rosh, in this place, not 'poison' at all, but 'head' — a translation which by no 
means imparts clearness to their versions. Probably the poisonous substance here 
called rosh received its name from the head {rosh) of the berry containing it ; or 
(as some think) because the poison of the serpent is secreted in its head. By 
' asps ' are meant some species of deadly adder or viper, whose poison, because 
quickly fatal, is described as akzar, 'fierce,' or 'virulent.' The Lxx. aniatos, 
and V. insanabile, 'incurable,' represent the effect rather than the quality of the 
poison. The A. V. ' cruel ' is emphatic, but too expressively moral to be applied 
to a physical poison. 



On the phrases 'vine of Sodom,' 'their vine,' and 'their wine,' it may be re- 
marked, — 

1. There is no historical record concerning the kind of vine cultivated around 
Sodom and Gomorrah, but growing in such a bituminous soil it would probably 
possess peculiar qualities, the memory of which was handed down by tradition 
for ages. The vine of Sodom may even have survived the overthrow of the 
cities of the plain. 

Some commentators suppose a designed reference to the plant which bore the 
fruit known as 'apples of Sodom,' and described by Josephus as of a beautiful 
appearance, but crumbling to dust when plucked. Fruit of this sort, the inside of 
which an insect {tenthradd) reduces to dust, leaving the outside skin fair and attrac- 
tive, has been found by modern travelers near the Dead Sea. 



64 DEUTERONOMY, XXXII. 37, 38, 42. 

2. It is obvious that Moses, under the similitude of a Sodom-like vine, grapes of 
gall, bitter clusters, wine like serpent-poison and deadly adder's gall, furnishes a 
moral portraiture of Israel's rebellious state. The vine of Sodom marks their 
degenerate character, its bitter and poisonous fruit their vicious tempers, and its 
venomous wine their injurious conduct toward the saints and prophets of God ; but 
it is extremely unlikely that such images would have been borrowed from merely 
traditional or fictitious objects. The entire passage appears to glance retrospect- 
ively at the manufacture and use of powerfully intoxicating compounds familiar to 
the people of Sodom, the knowledge of which may have been transmitted to much 
later times. The figures themselves are a tacit but striking warning against 
inflaming drinks ; no innocent substances, no good (dietetic) creatures, could have 
furnished such symbols to the poet-prophet of Israel. As the passage is part of a 
Hebrew poem, we may be permitted to convert it into English verse : 

Their vine from Sodom draws its birth, 
Reared in Gomorrah's putrid earth ; 
Their clustered-grapes are nought but gall, 
Their stalks are bitterness to all ; 
Their wine huge-reptiles' poison makes, 
And fiery gall of hooded snakes. 



Chapter XXXII. Verses 37, 38. 

37 And he shall say, Where are their gods, their rock in whom they 
trusted; 38 Which did eat the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the 
wine of their drink-offerings ? let them rise up and help you, and be 
your protection. 

And drank the wine of their drink-offerings] Hebrew, yishtu yayn 
nesikahm, ' and drank the wine of their libations.' So Lxx. and V. 



The wine poured out before the heathen idols was figuratively supposed to be 
drunk by them ; and Jehovah is represented as asking His faithless people what 
had become of those gods who had eaten and drunk (i. e. accepted) their offerings, 
and then deserted them in the hour of their need. 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 42. 

I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall 
devour flesh ; and that with the blood of the slain and of the captives 
from the beginning of revenges upon the enemy. 



" The Hebrew reads, ashkir kkitzai mid-dahm, ' I will satiate (drench) my arrows 
from blood ' ; the Lxx. methuso ta belee mou aph? haimatos iraumation, ' I will 
drench my darts from the blood of the wounded'; the V., inebriabo sagittas 
meas sanguine, ' I will inebriate my arrows with blood. ' The T. of Jonathan 
gives 'I will drench my arrows in the blood of their slain.' The Hebrew ashkir 
comes from shakar y 'to drink freely' of any sweet drink, and hence to be in- 
toxicated if the drink is fermented. In this passage the figure is confined to the 
idea of repletion, the Divine arrows being described as made to drink till they are 
soaked with the blood of those who fell under them, so great should be the slaughter 
of the guilty. 



DEUTERONOMY, XXXIII. 28. 



65 






Chapter XXXIII. Verse 28. 
Israel then shall dwell in safety alone : the fountain of Jacob shall 
be upon a land of corn and wine; also his heavens shall drop down 
dew. 



The fountain of Jacob] Hebrew, ain Yaaqov, 'the fountain (or eye) of 
Jacob.' As the same Hebrew word signifies 'eye' and 'fountain,' the versions 
differ. The Targumists take it in the sense of overflowing 'benediction.' 

Upon a land of corn and wine] Hebrew, el-eretz dahgan va-tirosh. This 
and the previous clause are rendered by the Lxx. epi gees Iakob, epi sito kai oino, 
'upon the land of Jacob, upon corn and wine.' The V. has ocuhis Jacob in terra 
frumenti ei vini, ' the eye Jacob in a land of corn and wine. ' The Syriac gives 
the usual triad — 'the fountain Jacob in a land of corn, and wine, and oil.' The 
Arabic reads, ' of expressed juice ' (etzer). By ' fountain ' many commentators 
understand ' offspring ' — his posterity spread like the waters of a fountain. If we 
read 'eye,' then it is a figure of the patriarch gazing with delight on the fruitful 
land prophetically stretched out before him. 



THE BOOK OF JOSHUA. 



Chapter V. Verse ii. 



And they did eat of the old corn of the land on the morrow 
after the passover, unleavened cakes, and parched corn in the self- 
same day. 



Unleavened cakes] Hebrew, matzotk, ' unfermented cakes.' 



The phrase ' selfsame day ' seems to indicate the eagerness with which the people, 
sick of the manna, desired to eat the fruits of this long-promised land. It is 
added, ' And the manna ceased ' ; teaching us that miracles of feeding are not works 
of supererogation, but disappear when the ordinary supplies of Providence are 
available. For the right use of these natural supplies men are as responsible as 
for the miraculous gifts, and for their abuse (by changing them) as sinful as the 
discontented Jews who loathed 'the bread from heaven.' 



Chapter IX. Verse 4. 

They did work wilily, and went and made as if they had been 
ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and wine bottles, 
old, and rent, and bound up. 



And wine bottles] Hebrew, va-nodoth yayin, 'and bottles of wine'; Lxx., 
askous oinou, 'skin bottles of wine ' ; V, utres vinarios, ' wine-bags.' 



Chapter IX. Verse 13. 
And these bottles of wine, which we filled, were new; and, behold, 
they be rent : and these our garments and our shoes are become old 
by reason of the very long journey. 



And these bottles of wine] Hebrew, ve-alleh nodoth hay-yayin, ' and these 
bottles of the wine ' ; the Lxx., kai outoi oi askoi ton oinou, ' and these skin bottles 
of the wine ' ; the V., utres vini, 'bags of wine.' 



JOSHUA, XXIV. 13. 



6 7 



Chapter XV. Verse ii. 
And the border went out unto the side of Ekron northward : and 
the border was drawn to Shicron, and passed along to mount Baalah, 
and went out unto Jabneel • and the goings out of the border were at 
the sea. 



Shicron] Hebrew, Shikron, 'drinking' or 'drunkenness.' Shicron was a 
town on the northern border of Judah. The reason of its name can only be 
conjectured. It may have had some relation to the abundance of shakar, ' sweet 
drink,' obtained from neighboring palm trees, or from the indulgence of the people 
in shakar, when not always safe to be drunk [see Note on John iv. 5], or, possibly, 
some famous drinker may have founded the city, whose name became a memorial 
of his intemperance. 






Chapter XXIV. Verse 13. 
And I have given you a land for which ye did not labor, and cities 
which ye built not, and ye dwell in them; of the vineyards and olive- 
yards which ye planted not do ye eat. 



The Hebrew, kerahtnin ve-zailhim, signifies 'vineyards and olive trees.' 
Lxx. has ampelonas kai elaionas ; the V., vineas et olivetas. 



The 



THE BOOK OF JUDGES. 



Chapter IV. Verse 19. 
And he said unto her, Give me, I pray thee, a little water to drink ; 
for I am thirsty. And she opened a bottle of milk, and gave him 
drink, and covered him. 



Chapter V. Verse 25. 
He asked water, and she gave him milk; she brought forth butter 
in a lordly dish. 



Milk] Hebrew, kkahlahv, 'milk'; the Lxx., gala; the V., lac. 

Butter] Hebrew, khemah, 'butter-milk'; the Lxx., bouturon ; the V., butyrum. 
It was the kind of milk best suited to assuage the warrior's thirst. Some critics 
read 'cream,' or milk from which the cream was not separated. Some think that 
both a fluid and a more solid form of milk were given to Sisera. Butter was not 
used by the ancients, nor is it used by the Orientals of the present day except medi- 
cinally. Utterly unsupported is the notion that Jael gave Sisera camel's milk which 
had fermented, in order that he might be thrown into an intoxicated stupor. J. D. 
Michaelis, who had referred to Niebuhr as a witness for the intoxicating property of 
camel's milk, is contradicted by Rosenmuller, who observes, "Dicit potius Nie- 
buhrius lac camelinum Arabibus, salubre et refrigerans haberi " (Niebuhr rather says 
that the milk of the Arabs' camel is healthy and refreshing). It is not always that 
an erring Michaelis has a critical Rosenmuller on his track. It is not certain, or even 
probable, that Jael resolved upon Sisera' s death till he had fallen asleep. His re- 
quest for no beverage but water, ' for I am thirsty,' is an example by which modern 
soldiers might profit. "Some think," says Dr Gill, "he did not ask for wine 
because he knew the Kenites did not drink any, and so of course kept none in 
their tents ; but though this was the custom of the Rechabites, who were the same 
with the Kenites (Jer. xxxv. 8), yet it is very probable the custom had not obtained 
among them, since it was enjoined by Jonadab their father, who lived in the time of 
Jehu (2 Kings x. 15) : ' She opened a bottle of milk, and gave him to drink,' which 
she did rather out of courtesy, being a better liquor, or with design to throw him 
into a sleep, which milk inclines to, making heavy, as all the Jewish commentators 
observe ; though Josephus has no authority to say, as he does, that the milk she 
gave him was bad and corrupt." Dr Gill is too hard on Josephus, who states 
that the milk {gala) was diephthoros eedee, which Rosenmuller considers to mean 
' acid already,' but not therefore bad to drink. 



JUDGES, IX. 12, 13. 69 



Chapter VI. Verse 19. 
And Gideon went in, and made ready a kid, and unleavened cakes 
of an ephah of flour : the flesh he put in a basket, and he put 
the broth in a pot, and brought it out unto him under the oak, and 
presented it. 



Unleavened cakes] Hebrew, matzoth, ' unfermented cakes.' [The same 
word occurs in verse 20, and twice in verse 21, and is correctly translated in each 
case 'unleavened cakes,' and not 'unleavened bread,' as in most other places of 
the A. V.] 



Chapter VII. Verse 25. 
And they took two princes of the Midianites, Oreb and Zeeb; and 
they slew Oreb upon the rock Oreb, and Zeeb they slew at the wine- 
press of Zeeb, and pursued Midian, and brought the heads of Oreb 
and Zeeb to Gideon on the other side Jordan. ' 



At the winepress of Zeeb] Hebrew, ve-yeqev Zeab, 'in (or at) the wine- 
press of Zeeb.' He may have taken refuge inside the press, hoping to be concealed 
till the pursuit was relinquished. 



Chapter VIII. Verse 2. 
And he said unto them, What have I done now in comparison of 
you ? Is not the gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim better than the 
vintage of Abi-ezer ? 



The gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim] Hebrew, olloth Ephraim, 'the 
gleanings of Ephraim.' The words 'of the grapes' in the A. V. are not in the 
Hebrew, but the sense is the same. 

The vintage of Abi-ezer] Hebrew, batzir Abiezer. Batzir, 'vintage,' from 
bahtzar, ' to cut away ' ; hence the cutting off of grapes when ripe = the vintage. 



The country of Ephraim was so prolific in grapes, that gleaning them after the 
regular grape-gathering was more profitable than to pluck the vineyards possessed 
by the descendants of Abi-ezer. This fact passed into a proverb to illustrate the 
superiority of some men's small actions over the greatest actions of others. 



Chapter IX. Verses 12, 13. 
12 Then said the trees unto the vine, Come thou, and reign over 
us. 13 And the vine said unto them, Should I leave my wine, which 
cheereth God and man, and go to be promoted over the trees ? 



V. 12. Unto the vine] Hebrew, bag-gaphen, 'to the vine.' 

V. 13. And the vine said unto them] Hebrew, vat-tomer lahhem hag-gephen, 

' said to them the vine.' 
Should I leave my wine, which cheereth God and man] Hebrew, 

hekhadalti eth-tiroshi hamsatnmaakh elohim va-anahshim, 'should I leave my 



70 JUDGES, IX. 27. 



tiros h (fruit), which gladdens gods and men ?' The Lxx. has mee apoleipsasa ion 
oinon mou ton euphrainonta theon kai anthropous, ' should I not be forsaking my 
wine, which rejoices God and men ? ' The Aldine and Complutensian editions of 
the Lxx. read, ton oinon [the Compl. ed., by a singular clerical error, has oikon, 
'house'] mou teen euphrosuneen, tou theou kai ton anthropon, 'my wine the joy 
of God and of men.' Codex A has apheisa ton oinon mou teen euphrosuneen 
ton para tou theou kai ton anthropon, 'leaving my wine the joy of those with God 
and men.' The V. has numquid possum desereri vinum meum quod Icetificat Deum 
et homines, ' how can I forsake my wine, which delights God and men ? ' The 
Syriac and Arabic versions translate tiros hi, 'my fruit.' Jonathan has 'How 
should I forsake my wine (khamri), from which the princes make their libations 
before the Lord, and in which they take delight?" 

God and MAN] The Hebrew elohim and anahshim are both in the plural, and 
it has been thought that as Jotham related the parable to idolaters he intended 
by elohim the gods they worshiped. Others have suggested that by elohim and 
anahshim a contrast is designed between men of rank and the common people, so 
that the clause would then read, ' which cheers the high and low.' 

In this parable, the most ancient on record, the vine is represented as refusing 
to become king over the other trees ; and, as in the case of the olive and the fig 
tree, the refusal is based on the impropriety of renouncing its own natural produce 
and function for the sake of mere supremacy and honor. 



Better be useful than ambitious, is the moral of this apologue. The vine speaks 
of what appertains to itself — its tirosh, — just as the olive had spoken of its ' fatness,' 
and the fig tree of its 'sweetness.' From a Temperance point of view it is im- 
material whether by tirosh be understood the solid fruit of the vine, or the delicious 
juice contained in the ripening clusters, — the 'imprisoned wine ' {ho oinos pepedee- 
menos), as Anacreon styles it. For reasons already assigned, ' vine-fruit ' is the best 
English equivalent. The vulgar opinion that an intoxicating liquor is spoken of 
because it is said to ' cheer God and man,' does violence to the passage. God can 
only be pleased by the fruit of the vine as the work of His power and the gift of 
His goodness ; and man is cheered, first by the sight, and afterwards by the use of 
it as a part of his daily food. The supposition that nothing can ' cheer ' except it 
be of an intoxicating quality is not more sensual than it is absurd. The very word 
employed in this passage, samaakh, translated ' to cheer,' occurs as a noun in Psa. 
iv. 7 — "Thou hast put gladness (simkhah) into my heart more than in the time 
when their corn {deghanam) and their wine {tirosham) increased." This verse at 
once refutes the alcoholic gloss, and throws light upon the parable itself. The 
increase of corn and tirosh cheers the husbandman, but the favor of God gives 
greater cheer to the humble and trustful soul. 



Chapter IX. Verse 27. 

And they went out into the fields, and gathered their vineyards, 
and trode the grapes, and made merry, and went into the house 
of their god, and did eat and drink, and cursed Abimelech. 



And gathered their vineyards] Hebrew, vay-yivtzeru eth-karmaihem, ' and 
cut off (stripped) their vineyards,' i. e. cut off the fruit from the vines. 



JUDGES, XIII. 2 — 7, 13, 14, 24, 25. 71 

And trode the grapes] Hebrew, vay-yidreku, * and they trode ' — the A. V. 
properly printing the words ' the grapes ' in italics to denote that they are added to 
complete the sense. 

And made merry] Hebrew, va-yaasu hillulim, * and they made songs ' (so 
the margin of the A. V. ), i. e. sang vintage songs. Gesenius suggests ' offered 
public thanksgivings.' The Lxx. transfers the Hebrew word, kai epoieesan 
Elloulim, * and they made Elloulim.' The V. has etfactis cantantium ckoris, ' and 
companies of singers having been formed. ' 

And did eat and drink, and cursed Abimelech] Hebrew, vay-yokelu 
vay-yishtu vayqallu eth-Abi?nelek, 'and they ate and drank, and cursed Abimelech.' 
It is not distinctly intimated that this feasting was conducive to the cursing in which 
the Shechemites indulged, but the rendering of the V. is peculiar, — et inter epulos 
et pocula maledicebant Abimelech, 'and between their feastings and cups they 
cursed Abimelech. ' Probably excited by inebriating liquor, they rioted and boasted 
with a foolish freedom that cost them dear. 



Chapter XIII. Verses 2 — 7, 13, 14, 24, 25. 
2 And there was a certain man of Zorah, of the family of the 
Danites, whose name was Manoah; and his wife was barren, and 
bare not. 3 And the angel of the Lord appeared unto the woman, 
and said unto her, Behold now, thou art barren, and bearest not : but 
thou shalt conceive, and bear a son. 4 Now therefore beware, 
I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not 
any unclean thing : 5 For, lo, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son : 
and no razor shall come on his head : for the child shall be a Nazarite 
unto God from the womb : and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of 
the hand of the Philistines. 6 Then the woman came and told her 
husband, saying, A man of God came unto me, and his countenance 
was like the countenance of an angel of God, very terrible: but 
I asked him not whence he was, neither told he me his name : 
7 But he said unto me, Behold, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son ; 
and now drink no wine nor strong drink, neither eat any unclean 
thing; for the child shall be a Nazarite to God from the womb to the 
day of his death. . . . i 3 And the angel of the Lord said unto 
Manoah, Of all that I said unto the woman let her beware. 14 She 
may not eat of any thing that cometh of the vine, neither let her drink 
wine or strong drink, nor eat any unclean thing: all that I com- 
manded her let her observe. .... 24 And the woman bare a 
son, and called his name Samson : and the child grew, and the Lord 
blessed him. 25 And the Spirit of the Lord began to move him at 
times in the camp of Dan between Zorah and Eshtaol. 



V. 4. Drink not wine nor strong drink] Hebrew, ve-al-tishti yayin 
ve-shakar, ' and thou shalt not drink wine and sweet drink. ' So also in verses 7 and 
14. The Lxx., Codex A, has oinon kai sikera in each place, but Codex B has 
oinon kai methusma, 'wine and strong drink.' The Complutensian edition has 
sikeran. In each place the V. has vinum et siceram. The Targumists, as before, 
render yaym by ' new wine, ' and shakar by ' old wine. ' 



72 JUDGES, XIII. 2—7, 13, 14, 24, 25. 

V. 14. Of any thing that cometh of the vine] Hebrew, mik-kol asher 
yatza mig-gephen hay-yayin, ' from all (anything) that comes forth from the vine 
of the wine,' i. e. the wine-tree. The Lxx. has ex ampelou ton oinou, 'from the 
vine of the wine.' The V. has simply ex vinea, 'from the vineyard.' 

Samson] Hebrew, Shimshon, 'sun-like." Josephus incorrectly interprets this 
name by ischuros, 'strong.' The Lxx. gives Sampson as the spelling, which has 
been extensively followed. 



1. The partial Nazaritism enjoined by the celestial messenger, with so much 
emphasis and solemnity, upon the mother of Samson, ' Now therefore beware, I 
pray thee ' (ver. 4) ; 'Of all that I said unto the woman let her beware ' (ver. 13), 
is exceedingly noteworthy ; for, passing by the other peculiarities of the Nazarite 
code, the prohibitive injunction was limited to yayin, shakar, and the produce of 
the vine, and to things unclean. Rejecting the idea of an elaborate whim, can it 
be doubted that reasons of a. physiological nature dictated this command? Unless 
on the hypothesis of some benefit to her babe, it is inexplicable that she should have 
been subjected to the dietetic rule of the Nazarites. Modern medical inquiries have 
made clear the fact, surmised by some ancient philosophers, of the powerful influence 
of maternal regimen on the uterine condition and future health of children. It 
seems, therefore, legitimate to conclude that the mother of Samson was stringently 
guarded against all possible use of intoxicating liquors in order that her heroic son 
might gain the full benefit, not of his own abstinence only, but of hers, from the 
period of his conception to his birth. That indulgence in the use of strong drink 
by expectant mothers would be injurious to their offspring, was known to the 
learned and wise among the ancients. Plato, Aristotle, Plutarch, etc., have 
noticed the hereditary transmission of intemperate propensities, and the legislation 
that imposed abstinence upon women had unquestionably in view the greater vigor 
of offspring — the mens sana in corpore sano (healthy mind in a healthy body), — one 
of the choicest inheritances of the human race. Matthew Henry aptly remarks, 
"Women with child ought conscientiously to avoid whatever they have reason to 
think will be in any way prejudicial to the health or good constitution of the fruit 
of their body. And perhaps Samson's mother was to refrain from wine and strong 
drink, not only because he was designed for a Nazarite, but because he was 
designed for a man of strength, which his mother's temperance would con- 
tribute to." 

2. The Nazaritism of Samson was to be complete and lifelong. Nor is there 
reason to doubt his fidelity to this part of his vow. In chapter xv. 18, 19, we 
have an account of one great triumph at the close of which "he was sore athirst, 
and called on the Lord," who "clave a hollow place that was in the jaw [or, in 
Lehi], and there came water thereout; and when he had drunk, his spirit came again 
and he revived." [See Note upon this verse.] Would that lesser heroes had been 
content to ' revive their spirits ' as innocently as did this scourge of the Philistines ! 
It is not pretended by any advocate of Temperance that Samson's abstinence was 
the cause of his stupendous strength : that was supernatural ; yet it may be legiti- 
mately inferred that this abstinence would not have been enjoined had intoxicating 
liquors possessed that invigorating property which has been ascribed to them. The 
Note in Bagster's 'Treasury Bible' (partially quoted under Numb. vi. 3) has 
this reference: — "It maybe here observed that when God intended to raise up 
Samson by his strength of body to scourge the enemies of Israel, He ordered that 
from his infancy he should drink no wine, but live by the rule of the Nazarites, 



JUDGES, XIII. 2—7, 13, 14, 24, 25. 73 

because that would greatly contribute to make him strong and healthy, intending, 
after Nature had done her titmost to form this extraordinary instrument of His pro- 
vidence, to supply her defects by His own supernatural power." It is incredible 
that the Most High should have deprived His ' chosen vessel ' of the class of articles 
necessary, or peculiarly conducive, to the highest development of his constitution ; 
and an intelligent perusal of this passage would have sufficed to nip in the bud that 
most pestiferous of physical superstitions, which has associated human energy, 
vitality, and longevity, with some use of alcoholic liquors. Classical literature is 
not deficient in passages that may compare with the one under consideration. The 
reader of the 'Iliad' will remember that Homer represents Hecuba as saying 
to her son Hector, ' to a weary man wine imparts great strength ' — andri de 
kekmeebti menos mega oinos aexei ; but the hero, wiser on this point than the 
anxious mother, answers, " Bring me not, honored mother, the wine, sweet as 
honey to the soul, lest thou shouldst weaken my limbs, and I should be forgetful 
of both strength and courage," — 

Mee mot oitwn, aeire meliphrona, potnia meeter, 
Mee meapoguiosees, menos d'alkees te lathomai. 

Iliad, Book VI., v. 265-6. 

Pope's note on these lines is striking : — "This maxim of Hector's concerning wine 
has a great deal of truth in it. It is a vulgar mistake to imagine the use of wine 
either rouses the spirits or increases strength. The best physicians agree with 
Homer on this point, whatever modern soldiers may object to this old heroic 
regimen. We may take notice that Samson as well as Hector was a water- 
drinker, for he was a Nazarite by vow, and as such was forbid the use of wine, — 
to which Milton alludes in his ' Samson Agonistes.' " Pope proceeds to quote the 
reply of Samson to the chorus ; but it is better to cite the whole of the lines relating 
to Samson's abstinence, as they appear in Milton's noble drama. 
Speaking to himself, the hero says, — 

"Abstemious I grew up, and thrived amain." 

The chorus speaks : — 

"Desire of wine, and all delicious drinks, 
Which many a famous warrior overturns, 
Thou couldst repress : nor did the dancing ruby 
Sparkling, outpoured, the flavor, or the smell, 
Or taste that cheers the hearts of gods and men, 
Allure thee from the cool crystalline stream." 

To which Samson replies, — 

" Wherever fountain or fresh current flowed 
Against the Eastern ray, translucent, pure, 
With touch ethereal of heaven's fiery red, 
I drank, from the clear milky juice allaying 
Thirst, and refreshed ; nor envied them the grape 
Whose heads that turbulent liquor fills with fumes." 

The chorus then responds, — 

" O madness ! to think use of strongest wines 
And strongest drinks our chief support of health, 
When God, with these forbidden, made choice to rear 
His mighty champion strong above compare, 
Whose drink was only from the liquid brook." *" 

3. On verses 24 and 25 Matthew Henry remarks : — "Strong men think them- 
selves greatly animated by wine (Psa. lxxviii. 65), but Samson drank no wine, and 
yet excelled in strength and courage, and everything bold and brave, for he had 



* Milton used ' liquid ' in the Latin sense of liquidus, clear, limpid. 

10 



74 judges, xv. 5, 1 8, 19. 

the Spirit of God moving him ; therefore, ' be not drunk with wine, but be filled 
with the Spirit,' who will come to those that are sober and temperate." That 
Samson's life was not perfect in a moral and spiritual sense is apparent from the 
historic notices preserved to us. This fact, however, gives no support to the 
popular plea that abstinence is no benefit, since Sepoys, Mohammedans, and other 
abstainers, are both cruel and impure; for man being so prone to evil from nature 
(the inference is inevitably suggested), the greater is the reason why he should 
sedulously guard against further perversion, by renouncing that which, in disturb- 
ing his brain, augments his depravity. In spite of his abstinence from ' turbulent 
liquors,' not because of it, Samson was beguiled; and while the value of abstinence 
is not, on that account, lessened, we have clearly impressed upon us the necessity 
of divine guidance and personal watchfulness in all things, to the well ordering of 
the Christian fife and the growth of the ' inner man \ in all the graces and virtues 
of the Spirit. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 5. 
Then went Samson down, and his father and his mother, to Tim- 
nath, and came to the vineyards of Timnath : and, behold, a young 
lion roared against him. 



To the vineyards OF Timnath] Hebrew, ad karmai Thimnathah, ' to the 
cultivated grounds of Ti mn ath.' 



Chapter XV. Verse 5. 
And when he had set the brands on fire, he let them go into the 
standing corn of the Philistines, and burnt up both the shocks, and 
also the standing corn, with the vineyards and olives. 



With the vineyards and olives] Hebrew, ve-ad kerem zaith, 'and to the 
kerem of the olive tree.' Here kerem is applied, not to a vineyard merely, but 
generically to ' cultivated land ' ; and the meaning is that the fire kindled by the 
foxes or jackals sent by Samson into the fields of standing corn, spread beyond the 
limits of the corn district, and seized upon the plot devoted to the cultivation of 
the olive. 

Chapter XV. Verses 18, 19. 
18 And he was sore athirst, and called on the Lord, and said, Thou 
hast given this great deliverance into the hand of thy servant : and 
now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the hand of the uncircum- 
cised ? 19 But God clave an hollow place that was in the jaw, and 
there came water thereout ; and when he had drunk, his spirit came 
again, and he revived : wherefore he called the name thereof Enhak- 
kore, which is in Lehi unto this day. 



It is not necessary to believe that water came from a hollow place made in the 
ass's jaw. The marginal reading is 'in Lehi ' ; and as the place where the victory 
was gained was called Lehi \_Lekhi, jaw-bone], the historian intimates that out of a 



JUDGES, XIX. 19. 75 



small rocky hollow God caused a spring to burst forth, by whose pure water the 
spirit of Israel's 'mighty champion' was revived. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 4. 

And it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley 
of Sorek, whose name was Delilah. 



In the valley of Sorek] Hebrew, benahkal Sorak, 'in the ravine of Sorek.' 
The margin of A. V. has ' by the brook of Sorek ' ; and, as before noticed, many of 
the ravines of Palestine, which are dry in summer, become the beds of deep torrents 
in the rainy season. The ravine of Sorek was situated near the ravine of Eshcol, 
both famous for the size and luscious quality of their grapes. The fame of this 
valley is thought to have given a name to some particular kind of wine, or to a 
wine of special excellence, as early as the days of Jacob. [See Notes on Gen. 
xlix. 11; Isa. v. 2; Jer. ii. 21.] 



Chapter XVI. Verse 25. 

And it came to pass, when their hearts were merry, that they 
said, Call for Samson, that he may make us sport. And they called 
for Samson out of the prison house ; and he made them sport : and 
they set him between the pillars. 



When their hearts were merry] Hebrew, Wyetov libahm, 'when it was 
good to their hearts '=when their hearts felt light or cheerful. This is an idiomatic 
expression, quite different from the phrase used of Joseph and his brethren (Gen. 
xliii. 34), and from the other used of the Shechemites ( Judg. ix. 27), and rendered 
'merry.' That the mirth of the Philistines, however, on the occasion was stimu- 
lated by indulgence in strong drink is highly probable. They had come ' to offer a 
great sacrifice to Dagon,' and revelry was the general concomitant of idolatrous 
rites. The expression here employed is in other places distinctly associated with 
strong drink and drinking excesses. (See Notes on 1 Sam. xxv. 36; 2 Sam. xiii. 
28; Est. i. 10.) Hence Milton may be acquitted of injustice to this Philistian 
gathering when he puts into the mouth of the messenger the words, — 

" The feast and noon grew high, and sacrifice 
Had filled their hearts with mirth, high cheer, and wine, 
When to their sports they turned." 

To which the semichorus adds that they were — 

" Drunk with idolatry, drunk with wine." 



Chapter XIX. Verse 19. 

Yet there is both straw and provender for our asses ; and there is 
bread and wine also for me, and for thy handmaid, and for the young 
man which is with thy servants : there is no want of any thing. 



76 JUDGES, XXI. 19 — 21. 

Bread and wine] Hebrew, lekhem ve-yayin. The Lxx. has artoi kai oinos, 
'loaves and wine ' ; the V., panem ac vinum, 'bread and wine.' 



Chapter XXI. Verses 19 — 21. 
19 Then they said, Behold, there is a feast of the Lord in Shiloh 
yearly in a place which is on the north side of Beth-el, on the east 
side of the highway that goeth up from Beth-el to Shechem, and on 
the south of Lebonah. 20 Therefore they commanded the children 
of Benjamin, saying, Go and lie in wait in the vineyards; 21 And 
see, and, behold, if the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in 
dances, then come ye out of the vineyards, and catch you every 
man his wife of the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of 
Benjamin. 

V. 19. A FEAST OF the Lord] Hebrew, khag-Yehovah, 'a festival of Jehovah,' 
= a festival in honor of Jehovah. This word feast, as distinguished from mishtek, 
is derived from khahgag, ' to move in a circle,' and signifies the sacred dance per- 
formed at appointed times. [For the use of khahgag'm reference to excess, see Note 
on Psa. cvii. 27.] 

V. 20. In the vineyards] Hebrew, battrahmim, 'in vineyards.' 
V. 21. Out of the vineyards] Hebrew, min-hak Wahmim, 'from the vine- 
yards.' Note the use oimin as 'out' or 'from.' 



THE BOOK OF RUTH. 



Chapter II. Verses 8, 9. 14. 

8 Then said Boaz unto Ruth, Hearest thou not, my daughter ? 
Go not to glean in another field, neither go from hence, but abide 
here fast by my maidens : 9 Let thine eyes be on the field that they 
do reap, and go thou after them: have I not charged the young 
men that they shall not touch thee? and when thou art athirst, go 
unto the vessels, and drink of that which the young men have drawn. 
. . . 14 And Boaz said unto her, At meal-time come thou hither, 
and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar. And she 
sat beside the reapers : and he reached her parched com, and she did 
eat, and was sufficed, and left. 



V. 9. Drink of that which the young men have drawn] The Hebrew for 
'have drawn ' is yishabun from shahav, ' to draw water.' The Lxx. has kai piesai 
othen ean hudreuontai ta paidaria, * and drink of that which the youths shall have 
drawn of water.' The V. is et bibe aquas de quibus et pueri bibunt, ' and drink the 
waters from which also the youths drink.' This wealthy Bethlehemite supplied 
his reapers with water, and probably found his harvest work despatched more 
quickly, and certainly more soberly, than the farmers of England get theirs executed 
on cider and beer. 

V. 14. In the vinegar] Hebrew, ba-khometz, 'in the fermented drink' — pro- 
bably sour wine (vin-aigre = vinegar), similar to theposca served out to the Roman 
legionaries. The Syriac adds she 'dipped the bread in milk,' and the Arabic has 
'she poured milk upon it' (the bread). Dr Gill remarks, "Vinegar was used 
because of the heat of the season, as Jarchi and Aben Ezra remark, for cooling 
and refreshment; and such virtues Pliny ascribes to vinegar as being refreshing to 
the spirits, binding and bracing the nerves, and very corroborating and strengthen- 
ing ; and it is at this day used in Italy, it is said, in harvest-time, when it is hot, 
where they also used wine mixed with vinegar and water, as Lavater says ; and 
who from a learned physician observes, that reapers instead of wine use vinegar 
mixed with a great deal of water, which they call 'household wine,' allayed with 
water ; to which if oil and bread be put it makes a cooling meal, good for work- 
men and travelers in the heat of the sun ; and the Targum calls it pottage boiled 
in vinegar. The Romans had an embamma or sauce made of vinegar, in which 
they dipped their food, and Theocritus makes mention of vinegar as used by 
reapers." 



78 RUTH, III. 7. 



Chapter III. Verse 7. 

And when Boaz had eaten and drunk, and his heart was merry, he 
went to lie down at the end of the heap of corn : and she came 
softly, and uncovered his feet, and laid her down. 



And his heart was merry] Hebrew, 'and he was good as to his heart.' 
[See Note on Judg. xvi. 25.] It is not said what Boaz ate and drank, but that he 
might be merry without partaking of intoxicants is well known to those who have 
made the experiment. 



THE FIRST BOOK OF SAMUEL. 



Chapter I. Verses 9 — 17. 
9 So Hannah rose up after they had eaten in Shiloh, and after 
they had drunk : (now Eli the priest sat upon a seat by a post of the 
temple of the Lord :) 10 And she was in bitterness of soul, and prayed 
unto the Lord, and wept sore, u And she vowed a vow, and said, 
O Lord of hosts, if thou wilt indeed look on the affliction of thine 
handmaid, and remember me, and not forget thine handmaid, but 
wilt give unto thine handmaid a man child, then I will give him unto 
the Lord all the days of his life, and there shall no razor come upon 
his head. 12 And it came to pass, as she continued praying before 
the Lord, that Eli marked her mouth. 13 Now Hannah, she spake 
in her heart; only her lips moved, but her voice was not heard: 
therefore Eli thought she had been drunken. 14 And Eli said unto 
her, How long wilt thou be drunken : put away thy wine from thee, 
is And Hannah answered and said, No, my lord, I am a woman of a 
sorrowful spirit : I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but have 
poured out my soul before the Lord. 16 Count not thine handmaid 
for a daughter of Belial : for out of the abundance of my complaint 
and grief have I spoken hitherto. 17 Then Eli answered and said, Go 
in peace : and the God of Israel grant thee thy petition that thou hast 
asked of him. 



V. 9. After they had drunk] The Lxx. has meta to phagein autous, * after 
they had eaten,' adding the words, not in our Hebrew text, ' and she stood before 
the Lord.' Codex A and the Complutensian edition give also, 'and after they had 
drunk,' and the Complut. ed. omits 'and she stood before the Lord.' The V. 
has postquam comederat et biberat, 'after she had eaten and drunk.' So reads the 
Targum of Jonathan Ben Uzziel. 

V. II. I WILL GIVE HIM UNTO THE LORD ALL THE DAYS OF HIS LIFE] This 

was in effect a dedication of her wished-for son to a life-long Nazaritism. The 
Lxx. has a clause not found in the Hebrew text or V. version — kai oinon kai 
methusma ou pietai, ' and of wine and strong drink he shall not drink. ' Philo 
quotes this clause, and pointedly refers to Samuel as ' chief of kings and prophets,' 
and as a Nazarite for life. 

V. 13. Therefore Eli thought she had been drunken] Hebrew, leshikorah, 
' for a drunken woman. ' So the Lxx., eis methuousan ; and the V., temulentiam 
(from temetum, the old Latin word for intoxicating wine). 



80 I SAMUEL, I. 24. 



V. 14. How long wilt thou be drunken ?] Hebrew, ad-mathi tishtakkahrin; 
Lxx., heds pote methustheesee ; V., tisquequb ebria eris? 

Put away thy wine from thee] Hebrew, hahsiri eth-yaynak maahlaik ; the 
~Lxx.,perielou ton oinon sou [Codex A adds apo sou'] kai poreuou ek prosdpou kuriou, 
' put away thy wine and depart from the presence of the Lord ' ; the V. has digere 
paulisper vini qtw mades, 'get rid quickly of the wine in which thou art steeped.' 

V. 15. I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink] Hebrew, ve-yayin 
ve-shakar lo shathithi, 'wine and strong drink I have not drunk' ; the Lxx., kai 
oinon kai methusma ou pepoka, ' and wine and strong drink I have not drunk ' ; 
the V., vinumque et omne quod inebriare potest non bibi, 'and wine and whatever 
is able to inebriate I have not drunk. ' The Ts. read, ' new wine and old I have 
not drunk.' 



A devout Hebrew matron, sorrowful from want of offspring and the exultation of 
a rival wife, goes up to the tabernacle to pour out her soul before God. Eli, the 
high priest, observing that her lips moved, and that she was under deep excite- 
ment, suspects her of intoxication, a suspicion which he bluntly expresses, jealous 
no doubt for the honor of the holy place. She respectfully repudiates the charge, 
and with so much evident sincerity that Eli not only credits her statement, but 
bestows on her his pontifical benediction. It may be noted, — 

1. That the readiness with which Eli concludes as to Hannah's inebriation in- 
dicates a prevailing corruption of morals, which had taken this peculiar form, and 
had deeply infected even the female population. 

2. That Hannah's disclaimer was associated with a conclusive proof of her inno- 
cence — 'I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink.' Where this statement can 
be truly made, drunkenness, in all its degrees, is impossible. The importance of 
being able to declare this is not small, for the speaker is then sure (as otherwise 
he may not be) that he is entirely free from alcoholic excitement, which, if short 
of intoxication, is injurious to body and soul. 'I am not excited by drink,' is a 
conviction only attainable by abstinence, and not a little consoling under reproach. 
Hannah, be it noted, did not resort to intoxicating liquor to drive out or drown her 
sorrows — a striking contrast to the supposed permission in Prov. xxxi. 6, 7. (See 
Note on that passage.) She sought comfort not in potations, but in prayer, — 'I 
have poured out my soul unto the Lord,' — and she received her reward. Would 
that all our women were like her ! 

3. When Hannah desired not to be counted ' a daughter of Belial ' — i. e. a 
daughter of wickedness or destruction — she presented a vivid description of every 
female drunkard, who is so corrupted by drink as to lose all womanly virtue, 
and to be prepared for every shameful deed. Drunkenness in women is peculiarly 
odious and horrible, and when it becomes confirmed is well-nigh incurable, except 
by forcible deprivation of the raging liquor. In order to arrest the spread of this 
corrosive vice among the women of Christendom, should Christians esteem absti- 
nence from its physical cause too great a sacrifice to be volunteered ? 



Chapter I. Verse 24. 

And when she had weaned him, she took him up with her, with 
three bullocks, and one ephah of flour, and a bottle of wine, and 
brought him unto the house of the Lord in Shiloh : and the child 
was young. 



I SAMUEL, XIV. 2. 8 1 



And a bottle of wine] Hebrew, ve-nabel yayin, ' and a bottle of wine.' This 
was as an offering, together with the flour and the three bullocks (or as the Lxx. 
reads, ' one bullock of three years old ' ). The Lxx. retains the Hebrew word in kai 
nebel oinou, ' and a nebel of wine. ' The V. has et amphora vini, ' and an amphora 
of wine.' The Roman amphora was a two-handled jar commonly holding seven 
English gallons, but the word is here used without any intention of defining the 
size of the Hebrew nebel. 



Chapter VIII. Verse 14, 15. 
14 And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your olive- 
yards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. 15 And 
he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give 
to his officers, and to his servants. 



Your vineyards] Hebrew, karmaikem, 'your vineyards.' 



Chapter X. Verse 3. 
Then shalt thou go on forward from thence, and thou shalt come 
to the plain of Tabor, and there shall meet thee three men going up 
to God to Beth-el, one carrying three kids, and another carrying 
three loaves of bread, and another carrying a bottle of wine. 



A bottle of wine] Hebrew, nabel yayin. The Lxx. gives askon oinou, * skin- 
bag of wine'; the V., lagenam vini, 'flagon of wine.' 



Chapter XIV. Verse 2. 
And Saul tarried in the uttermost part of Gibeah under a pome- 
granate tree which is in Migron : and the people that were with him 
were about six hundred men. 



A pomegranate tree] Hebrew, Rimmon. The Lxx. has hupo teen rhoan, 
'under the pomegranate'; the V., sub malogranato, 'under the malegranate. ' 
But by Rimmon in this passage is probably meant a fortified place which had de- 
rived its name from the growth of the pomegranate. Concerning this tree the 
'Treasury Bible' observes, "It is, according to the Linnsean system, a genus of 
the Icosandria Monogynia class of plants, and is a low tree growing very commonly 
in Palestine and other parts of the East. It has several small angular boughs, very 
thick and bushy, covered with a reddish bark, and some of them armed with sharp 
thorns. Its blossoms are large, of an elegant red color inclining to purple, com- 
posed of several stalks resembling a rose, in the hollow of the cup ; this cup is 
oblong, hard, purple, having a figure somewhat like that of a bell. It is chiefly 
valued for its fruit, which is exceedingly beautiful, of the form and size of a large 
apple, with a reddish rind, and red within ; being full of small kernels, with red 
grains, replenished with a generous liquor, of which, Sir John Chardin informs us 
they still make considerable quantities of wine in the East, particularly in Persia." 
[See Note on Song of Sol. viii. 2.] 
11 



82 I SAMUEL, XXV. II, 1 8, 36 — 38. 

Chapter XVI. Verse 20. 
And Jesse took an ass laden with bread, and a bottle of wine, and 
a kid, and sent them by David his son unto Saul. 



And a bottle of wine] Hebrew, ve-nod yayin, 'and a bottle of wine.' 



Chapter XXII. Verse 7. 
Then Saul said unto his servants that stood about him, Hear now, 
ye Benjamites; will the son of Jesse give every one of you fields and 
vineyards, and make you all captains of thousands, and captains of 
hundreds ? 



And vineyards] Hebrew, u-krahmin, 'and vineyards.' 



Chapter XXV. Verses ii, 18, 36—38. 
11 Shall I then take my bread, and my water, and my flesh that I have 
killed for my shearers, and give it unto men, whom I know not whence 
they be? . . . 18 Then Abigail made haste, and took two hundred 
loaves, and two bottles of wine, and five sheep ready dressed, and 
five measures of parched earn, and an hundred clusters of raisins, and 
two hundred cakes of figs, and laid them on asses. ... 36 And Abi- 
gail came to Nabal ; and, behold, he held a feast in his house, like the 
feast of a king ; and Nabal's heart was merry within him, for he was 
very drunken : wherefore she told him nothing, less or more, until the 
morning light. 37 But it came to pass in the morning, when the wine 
was gone out of Nabal, and his wife had told him these things, that 
his heart died within him, and he became as a stone. 38 And it 
came to pass about ten days after, that the Lord smote Nabal, so 
that he died. 



V. 11. And my water] Hebrew, ve-etk-mamai, 'and my waters' — a Hebrew 
idiom which, the V. preserves, et aquas meas. The Lxx. singularly reads, kai ton 
oinon mou, ' and my wine.' Did the Lxx. translators think that Nabal, being a sot, 
ironically or figuratively spoke of wine as ' my water ' ? Aquila gives amphoreis, 
'jars.' The T. of Jonathan and the Arabic have ' my drink.' 

V. 18. Two bottles of wine] Hebrew, ushnaim nivlai yayin. The Lxx. 
has duo angeia oinou, 'two vases (or vessels) of wine'; the V., duos utres vini, 
' two leathern bags of wine.' 

A hundred clusters of raisins] Hebrew, umaah tzimmuqim, ' and a hun- 
dred raisin-clusters' — from tzahmaq, 'to dry up.' The Lxx. reads, kai gomor hen 
staphidon, ' and one homer of raisins ' ; but other copies have kai hekaton endes- 
mous, 'and a hundred bunches.' The V. gives et centui?i ligaturas uvce passce, 
' and a hundred bunches of dried grapes.' 

V. 36. A feast] Hebrew, miskteh; the Lxx. potos ; the V., convivium. 

His heart was merry] The Hebrew has the idiomatic ' his heart was good 
to him.' The Lxx. is literal, agathee, 'good'; the V., jocundum, 'jocund' 'or 
gay.' 



I SAMUEL, XXX. II, 12. 83 

For he was very drunken] The Hebrew is shikkor ad meod, ' drunken (or 
drenched) with force ' — i. e. excessively; the Lxx., kai autos methuon heds sphodra, 
'and he was being drunk, even exceedingly'; the V., erat enim ebrius nimis, 'for 
he was drunk very much.' 

V. 37. When the wine was gone out of Nabal] Hebrew, v'tzath hay- 
yayin min Nabal, 'in the going out of the wine from Nabal'; Lxx., hos 
exeneepsen apo tou oinou Nabal, 'when Nabal had become sober from the 
wine.' The phrase here employed for 'becoming sober' is remarkable; it lite- 
rally signifies 'becoming as an abstainer'' — as those are who drink not. The word 
was often used by the Apostles in after times. [See Notes on the New Testa- 
ment.] The V. has here cum digessisset vinum Nabal, ' when Nabal had digested 
the wine.' 



The phrase 'going out' is singularly accurate, for though perhaps merely 
intended to describe the subsidence of the intoxication produced by the wine, it 
exactly accords with the most recent discoveries of science, that intoxication passes 
off because the alcoholic spirit does go out of the body — being expelled from it by 
all the excretory organs as an intruder into and disturber of the living house 
which God has 'fearfully and wonderfully made.' 

Nabal may have been prone to folly by his natural temperament and disposition, 
but his habits of life made the folly chronic and incurable. Free drinking had not 
disposed him to generosity or justice, and in the morning, after a debauch, having 
learnt the danger he had incurred, his nervous system was too enfeebled to recover 
from the shock it received, and so in ten days he died. 



Chapter XXVI. Verse ii. 
The Lord forbid that I should stretch forth mine hand against the 
Lord's anointed : but, I pray thee, take thou now the spear that is at 
his bolster, and the cruse of water, and let us go. 



And the cruse of water] Hebrew, ve-eth-tzappakhath ham-maim, ' and the 
cruse of the waters ' = the water-skin. The Lxx. has ton phakon tou hudatos, ' the 
lentil-shaped vase of water.' Aquila has angos, 'a vase'; Symmachus, nuk- 
topotion, ' a night-drinking vessel ' ; the V., scyphum aquce, ' a goblet of water.' 



The king of Israel did not disdain to carry with him a water-vessel on this 
expedition, and the statement (ver. 12) that David took it from Saul's bolster, 
proves the value attached to it by the royal traveler. 



Chapter XXX. Verses ii, 12. 
11 And they found an Egyptian in the field, and brought him to 
David, and gave him bread, and he did eat; and they made him 
drink water ; 12 And they gave him a piece of a cake of figs, and two 
clusters of raisins : and when he had eaten, his spirit came again to 
him : for he had eaten no bread, nor drunk any water, three days and 
three nights. 



V. 12. And two clusters of raisins] Hebrew, ushnai tzimmuqim, ' and two 
raisin clusters.' Codex B of the Lxx. omits this clause, but Codex A has k6t\ 



84 I SAMUEL, XXX. 1 6. 



diakosious stapkidas, ' and two hundred raisins.' Aquila gives kai duo stapkidas, 
'and two raisins'; Symmachus, endesmous staphidon, 'bunches of raisins'; the 
V., et duas ligaturas uvce passes, 'and two bunches of dried grapes.' 



As David's men gave the fainting Egyptian water only, most probably they were 
themselves provided with no other drink; and upon' it, with bread and fruit, he 
was soon 'refreshed,' though for a period of almost seventy hours he had been 
deprived of every kind of sustenance. If inebriating liquors were unknown, many 
emergencies in which they are deemed essential for safety would be surmounted 
successfully, nay, more easily without them. 



Chapter XXX. Verse 16. 
And when he had brought him down, behold, they were spread 
abroad upon all the earth, eating, and drinking, and dancing, because 
of all the great spoil that they had taken out of the land of the Phi- 
listines, and out of the land of Judah. 



Eating, and drinking, and dancing] Hebrew, oklim, veshothim, vekhoggim. 
The Lxx. has esthiontes, kai pinontes, kai heortazontes, ' eating, drinking, and fes- 
tival-keeping ' ; the V.; comedentes, et bibentes, et quasi festum celebrantus diem, 
' eating and drinking, and celebrating as it were a feast day.' 



These Amalekites were caught much in the same predicament as the troops of 
the confederate kings when overtaken by Abraham. History has often repeated 
itself in the surprise and rout of intemperate marauders. 



THE SECOND BOOK OF SAMUEL. 



Chapter VI. Verse 19. 
And he dealt among all the people, even among the whole multi- 
tude of Israel, as well to the women as men, to every one a cake of 
bread, and a good piece of flesh, and a flagon of wine. So all the 
people departed every one to his house. 



A flagon of wine] Hebrew, ashishah, 'a raisin-cake.' The Lxx. has laga- 
non apo teeganou, 'a cake-cooked-with-oil from the frying-pan' =a pancake or 
fricassee. The rendering of the V. is similam frixam oleo, ' and fine flour fried 
in oil,' this similam being, perhaps, related to simnellus whence the English 
' sinnel,' a sweet cake. The T. of Jonathan gives ' one portion ' (manthah khadah). 
The Syriac has a 'cake.' The English translators, seemingly puzzled with this 
word, rendered it 'flagon,' a vessel for liquids, but thinking that a dry flagon 
would be of little use, added in italics, 'of wine.' [On Ashishah see Prel. Dis.] 
Gesenius, who derives ashisk from an unused root signifying 'to press together,' 
describes ashishim (the plural) as " liba, cakes, specially- such as were made of 
grapes, and dried and pressed into a certain form. They are mentioned as 
dainties, with which those who were wearied with a journey and languid were 
refreshed. This word differs from tzimmnq, i. e. dried grapes, but not pressed to- 
gether into a cake. ' ' Elsewhere he speaks of ashish as ' a cake of dried fg-s, ' though 
in distinguishing it in another place from debalim, cakes of dried figs, he refers to the 
Mishna as explaining it to be 'cakes made of boiled lentiles.' [See Notes on the 
parallel passage, I Chron. xvi. 3; and on Song of Sol. ii. 5, and Hos. hi. I.] 



Chapter XL Verse 13. 
And when David had called him, he did eat and drink before him ; 
and he made him drunk: and at even he went out to lie on his bed 
with the servants of his lord, but went not down to his house. 



And HE made him drunk] Hebrew, vayshakrahu, ' and he made him drunk ' 
(or satiated with shakar). The Lxx. reads, kai emethusen auton ; the V., et 
inebriavit eum, 'and he inebriated him.' 



No transaction of David's life reflects upon him so much disgrace as the one 
portrayed in this narrative. When he sent for Uriah, in order to conceal the 



86 2 SAMUEL, XVI. I, 2. 

effect of his sinful intercourse with Bathsheba, he employed the drink that was a 
mocker to overcome the scruples of his valiant servant. Uriah yielded to the 
liquor with which he was plied, but failing to do as the king desired, his death was 
resolved upon, and brought about with great baseness. It is instructive to notice 
what instrument was employed by the guilty monarch to excite merely animal con- 
cupiscence in the hardy soldier; nor is it irrelevant to suggest that 'the lust which 
conceived and brought forth sin' in the sweet singer of Israel may have been 
stimulated by the same distempering draught. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 28. 
Now Absalom had commanded his servants, saying, Mark ye now 
when Amnon's heart is merry with wine, and when I say unto you, 
Smite Amnon ; then kill him, fear not : have not I commanded you ? 
be courageous, and be valiant. 



When Amnon's heart is merry with wine] Hebrew, ketov lav Amnon 
bay-yayin, 'when good (is) the heart of Amnon with (or by) wine.' The Lxx. 
gives idete hds an agathunthee hee kardia Amnon en to oino, ' see when the heart 
of Amnon shall become good with wine.' The V. has observate cum temulentus 
fuerit Amnon vino, 'mark when Amnon shall be intoxicated with wine.' 

Absalom chose for the exaction of his revenge the period when his brother, by 
means of the wine, was both thrown off his guard and least able to defend himself. 
That Amnon should have been 'given to wine' is a trait in his character con- 
sistent with the unbridled licentiousness that was bringing upon him his brother's 
vengeance. We can hardly suppose the connection of the vices to have been one 
of simple co-existence, though the silence of the history does not warrant a very 
positive opinion on the point. 



Chapter XVI. Verses i, 2. 
1 And when David was a little past the top of the hill, behold, Ziba 
the servant of Mephibosheth met him, with a couple of asses saddled, 
and upon them two hundred loaves of bread, and an hundred bunches 
of raisins, and an hundred of summer fruits, and a bottle of wine. 
2 And the king said unto Ziba, What meanest thou by these ? And 
Ziba said, The asses be for the king's household to ride on ; and the 
bread and summer fruit for the young men to eat ; and the wine, that 
such as be faint in the wilderness may drink. 



V. 1. And a hundred bunches of raisins] Hebrew, u-maah tzimmuqim, 
'and a hundred raisin-bunches.' The Lxx. has kai hekaton staphides, 'and a 
hundred raisins ' ; the V., et centum alligaturis uvce passce, 'and with a hundred 
bunches of dried grapes.' The T. of Jonathan has 'a hundred stalks of grapes ' 
(with the grapes on). 

And a bottle of wine] Hebrew, ve-navel yayin. The Lxx. gives kai nebel 
oinou, ' and a nebel of wine ' ; the V., et utre vini, ' and (laden) with a skin-bag of 
wine.' 

V. 2. And the wine] Hebrew, ve-hay-yayin, 'and the wine'; Lxx., oinos ; 
the V., vinum. 



2 SAMUEL, XXIII. 1 5 — 1 7. 87 

The solid substances here enumerated were for food, the single bottle of yayin 
for any who might faint. The wine might or might not be alcoholic. Were intoxi- 
cating liquors now restricted to contingencies like the one described in this passage, 
their use, whether necessary or not, would be strictly medicinal, and society would 
be saved from the ravages of an endemic and ceaseless pest. 



Chapter XXIII. Verses 15—17. 
is And David longed, and said, Oh that one would give me drink 
of the water of the well of Beth-lehem, which is by the gate ! 16 And 
the three mighty men brake through the host of the Philistines, and 
drew water out of the well of Beth-lehem, that was by the gate, and 
took it, and brought it to David : nevertheless he would not drink 
thereof, but poured it out unto the Lord. 17 And he said, Be it far 
from me, O Lord, that I should do this : is not this the blood of the 
men that went in jeopardy of their lives? therefore he would not 
drink it. These things did these three mighty men. 



It was natural that David should long for a draught of water from the well of 
Bethlehem — a well dear to him, no doubt, from many early associations. Often 
when a shepherd youth had it slaked his thirst and that of the flock he tended, 
and now he sighs for a beaker of the cool clear beverage. Three of his noblest 
captains watch the woods, and hasten to realize their monarch's wish. They pierce 
through the Philistian lines, draw the water, and return. David's eye bespeaks his 
pleasure and his gratitude, but before the liquid treasure is at his lips he pours it 
out as a libation to the Lord, with words of dedication that must have solemnly 
impressed all who stood around him. The bright water, as he looked upon it, 
seemed to take a scarlet tinge when he thought of the lives that had been risked to 
fetch it, 'therefore he would not drink it.' It had been obtained by courage and 
affection inspired of God, and to Him it should be offered. David never was more 
magnanimous than at this moment. Truly was he now the ' man after God's own 
heart,' and never dearer than at that time to his mighty men and faithful soldiers. 
This deed was a psalm, sublime in its significance, and for ever sweet to all loving 
hearts in its pure simplicity. Is the Christian world prepared to imitate as well as 
to admire this act of David ? He had before him that which was endeared to him 
by memory, useful in itself, and very desirable to him under the circumstances ; 
but he 'would not drink of it,' because life had been risked, not lost, in its pro- 
curement. Christians have before them drinks which can boast no such innocent 
reminiscences — which are not necessary — of little or no use — nay, certainly of some 
injury habitually consumed — which are not procurable without an enormous waste 
of food and much needless labor on the Lord's day — drinks, the common sale and 
use of which floods the kingdom with every species of vice, misery, want, sickness, 
sin, and shame, slaying hecatombs year by year, till the number of victims baffles 
computation. Shall Christians drink such liquors ? If they will, can they claim 
moral equality with the king of Israel ? and how do they vindicate their spiritual 
relationship with David's Son and Lord, who poured out His own blood for the 
ungodly ? To say the least, how must inferiority and inconsistency be confessed 
when, in spite of reiterated teaching and appeal, intoxicating beverages are per- 
sistently used by those who glory that they live under a dispensation greater, be- 
cause more spiritual, than that which branched forth in the laws of Moses and 
blossomed in the lyrics of the son of Jesse ! 



THE FIRST BOOK OF KINGS. 



Chapter IV. Verse 20. 



Judah and Israel were many, as the sand which is by the sea in 
multitude, eating and drinking, and making merry. 



Eating and drinking, and making merry] Hebrew, oklim ve-shothim 
usmakhim, 'eating and drinking, and rejoicing.' The confidence and peace 
inspired by Solomon's government allowed the agricultural wealth of the people to 
multiply, and with it their means of legitimate enjoyment. 



Chapter IV. Verse 25. 

And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and 
under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beer-sheba, all the days of 
Solomon. 



Every man under his own vine] Hebrew, ish takhath gaphno, 'a man 
under his vine.' This proverbial phrase, 'under his vine and fig tree,' though it 
cannot be understood to imply that every man, or even every head of a family, had 
a vine or fig tree as his own, is indicative of the extent to which both the vine and 
fig tree were cultivated in the Holy Land for purposes of food. These were to the 
Jewish peasant what his kitchen-garden or ' allotment ' is to the English laborer. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 7, 8. 

7 And the king said unto the man of God, Come home with me, 
and refresh thyself, and I will give thee a reward. 8 And the man of 
God said unto the king, If thou wilt give me half thine house, I will 
not go in with thee, neither will I eat bread nor drink water in this 
place. 

"To eat bread and drink water" appears to have been a colloquial 

phrase, doubtless originating in the universal conviction of their value as the prime 

necessaries of life. The worth of water is best known, because truly felt, in sultry 

climes. 

" Till taught by pain, 
Men know not what good water's worth." 



I KINGS, XX. 1 6. 89 



Chapter XVI. Verses 8, 9. 
8 In the twenty and sixth year of Asa king of Judah began Elah 
the son of Baasha to reign over Israel in Tirzah, two years. 9 And 
his servant Zimri, captain of half his chariots, conspired against him, 
as he was in Tirzah, drinking himself drunk in the house of Arza, 
steward of his house in Tirzah. 



V. 9. Drinking himself drunk] Hebrew, shotheh shikhor, * drinking (and) 
being surcharged,' or shakarized. The Lxx. reads, peinon methuon, 'drinking, 
being drunk ' ; the V., bibens et temulentus, * drinking and drunk.' 



Chapter XVII. Verse 6. 
And the ravens brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and 
bread and flesh in the evening ; and he drank of the brook. 



The great prophet of Israel was supplied with food in his seclusion by the special 
providence of Israel's God, but for his daily drink he was indebted to the running 
stream, of which he partook gratefully, without envying ' the drunkards of Ephraim.' 
Bread and flesh were more than hermit's fare ; u-rnm han-nahkal yishteh, ' and from 
the brook he drank,' that which truly was to him what brandy has been falsely 
designated, 'the water of life.' Some eminent commentators believe that Elijah 
was a Nazarite, and it is exceedingly probable that this point of resemblance 
between him and the forerunner of Christ was not absent. 



Chapter XIX. Verse 6. 
And he looked, and, behold, there was a cake baken on the coals, 
and a cruse of water at his head. And he did eat and drink, and laid 
him down again. 

The prophet's 'bread and water' were insured. Twice was the cake and the 
cruse ready to his hand when needed, and in the strength of what he had eaten and 
drunk (verse 8) ' he went forty days unto Horeb the mount of God.' 



Chapter XX. Verse 16. 
And they went out at noon. But Ben-hadad was drinking himself 
drunk in the pavilions, he and the kings, the thirty and two kings that 
helped him. 

Drinking himself drunk] Hebrew, shotheh shikkor. The Lxx. has peino 
methuon ; the V. bibebat temulentus. [See Note on xvi. 8, 9.] The Syriac has 
'drank old wine.' 



It is said (ver. 12) that Benhadad was 'drinking' with his thirty-two confederate 
petty kings or chiefs, and the drinking bout continued till the whole of them were 
filled to the full. The liquor probably being in some degree intoxicating, he not 
only neglects the duties of a general, but gives a boastful and ridiculous command 
to take all the Israelites alive, whether they had sallied out for peace or war ; and 
hence the besieged and lately despairing soldiers of Ahab obtained an easy victory. 
12 



90 I KINGS, XXI. I. 



Chapter XXI. Verse i. 
And it came to pass after these things, that Naboth the Jezreelite 
had a vineyard, which was in Jezreel, hard by the palace of Ahab 
king of Samaria. 

A vineyard] Hebrew, kerem, an enclosure of land cultivated and set with 
vines and other plants. Roberts says, "People in England will scarcely be able 
to appreciate the value which the Orientals place on a garden. The food of most 
of them consists of vegetables, roots, and fruits; their medicines, also, being 
indigenous, are mostly produced in their gardens. Here they have their fine fruit- 
trees, and their constant shade; and here they have their wells and places for 
bathing." 

Kerem also occurs, and is translated 'vineyard,' in verses 2, 3, 6, 7, 15, 16, 18. 



THE SECOND BOOK OF KINGS. 



Chapter IV. Verse 39. 
And one went out into the field to gather herbs, and found a wild 
vine, and gathered thereof wild gourds his lap full, and came and 
shred them into the pot of pottage : for they knew them not. 



A wild vine] Hebrew, gephen sahdeh, 'a vine of the field.' The Lxx. has 
ampelon en to agro, 'a vine in the field.' The V. reads, vitem sylvestrem, 'a vine 
growing-in-the-woods.' Probably this was a plant resembling a vine, but entirely 
different in nature. 

Wild gourds] Hebrew, paqquoth sahdeh, 'wild cucumbers, cucumeres asi- 
nini,'' says Gesenius. The Lxx. has tolupeen agrian, 'wild gourds'; the V., 
colocynthides. 

The fruit of the colocynth is of an attractive appearance, but the taste is nauseous, 
and the effect very hurtful. Others suggest 'fox-grapes.' 



1. The paqquoth, plucked from the 'wild vine,' were put into the pot in 
ignorance of their nature. Many foolish things are done through ignorance, but 
as believing ignorance does not alter the quality, neither will it avert the physical 
consequences, of noxious things. 

2. The bitter taste of this pottage excited suspicion, and induced those who had 
tasted to cry, ' Death is in the pot.' The taste of many poisons, but not of all, is 
unpleasant. Anhydrous alcohol (alcohol so highly rectified as to be almost free from 
water) is so acrid and pungent as not to be drinkable ; and articles of any perceptible 
alcoholic strength are disagreeable to the unvitiated palate. Intoxicating liquors, 
however, are often so elaborated as to be suggestive of no danger even while 
exceedingly injurious. An eminent writer says of some highly prized French 
wines, 'They fall like snow on the palate, but burn like fire in the veins.' When 
the sentinels of nature are deceived the danger is all the greater. Happy would it 
be if, warned by the voice of science and the facts of every-day life, our country- 
men would exclaim, ' There is death in the pot of strong drink ' ; and happier 
still will be the day when it can be added, ' And they would not drink thereof.' 



Chapter V. Verse 26. 
And he said unto him, Went not mine heart with thee, when the 
man turned again from his chariot to meet thee ? Is it a time to 
receive money, and to receive garments, and oliveyards, and vine- 
yards, and sheep, and oxen, and menservants, and maidservants ? 



And vineyards] Hebrew, ukWahmim, 'vineyards.' 



92 2 KINGS, XVIII. 4, 31. 

Chapter XVI. Verse 13. 
And he burnt his burnt offering and his meat offering, and poured 
his drink offering, and sprinkled the blood of his peace offerings, 
upon the altar. 

And poured his drink offering] Hebrew, vay-yasak etk-nisko, 'and he 
poured his pouring ' (libation). 

So verse 15, ' their drink offerings ' is in the Hebrew niskaikim, ' their libations.' 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 4. 

He removed the high places, and brake the images, and cut down 
the groves, and brake in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had 
made : for unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to 
it : and he called it Nehushtan. 



Hezekiah removed the external associations and incentives to idolatry, leaving 
the spirit of idolatry to be acted upon by the force of tuition and example. He 
broke in pieces even the brazen serpent, so memorable in the history of the Jews, 
because it had been made an object of worship. Hence we perceive, I, that even 
things intrinsically harmless should be abandoned when this is necessary to a work 
of moral reformation ; 2, that such an abandonment will always be attended with 
the blessing of God ; 3, that the common objection to abstinence from intoxicating 
liquors — that the abuse of a thing is no reason against its use — can only be 
sustained when it is shown (1) that their use is more useful than their abuse is 
hurtful ; and (2) that the use can be disconnected from the abuse. If not — if the 
abuse be a thousandfold more hurtful than the use is beneficial, and if no means of 
separating the social use from the social abuse have been discovered, — if, indeed (as 
is the case with alcohol), use is physiological abuse in itself, and tends to engender 
abuses of the gravest character, — then wisdom has but one counsel to give, and 
prudence and philanthropy have but one practice to pursue. 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 31. 
Hearken not to Hezekiah : for thus saith the king of Assyria, Make 
an agreement with me by a present, and come out to me, and then eat 
ye every man of his own vine, and every one of his fig tree, and drink 
ye every one the waters of his cistern. 



And eat ye every man of his own vine] Hebrew, ve-iklu ish gaphno, ' and 
eat ye (each) man his vine,'=z. e. the produce of the vine. The Lxx. has pietai 
aneer teen ampelon autou, '(each) man shall drink his vine' ; the V., et comedet 
ttnusquisque de vinea sua, 'and every one shall consume of his own vineyard.' 

The water of his own cistern] Hebrew, mai voro, 'waters of his cistern' or 
' pit.' Cisterns are sometimes cut out of stone. 



The speaker, Rabshakeh (whose name signifies 'chief cup-bearer,' perhaps 
given to him on account of his office), appeals to the apparent and materialistic 
interests of the people ; and when he represents his master, the king of Assyria, as 



2 KINGS, XVIII. 32. 93 



permitting the Jews, if they paid him tribute, to eat of their vines, we may be sure 
that he adapted his appeal to their recognized mode of life. It is, in truth, a fact now, 
as it was in the time of Hezekiah (b.c. 712), that the fruit of the vine is much more 
used and valued as an article of diet than for the manufacture of wine of any sort. 
The Rev. Smylie Robson, a missionary to the Jews in Syria, says in a letter from 
Damascus, February, 1845 (published in the Irish Presbyterian Missionary Herald 
of April and May, 1845), "It is well known that many parts of the mountains of 
Lebanon are among the most thickly peopled and best cultivated districts of the land. 
This is the part of the country in which I have traveled most. The food of the 
inhabitants consists principally of fruit, milk, vegetables, bread made of the flour 
of wheat and Indian corn. Wheat is everywhere cultivated, and the bread made 
of it constitutes a large portion of the food of all classes. The most important 
kinds of fruit are olives and grapes. Olives are eaten either raw or dressed in 
various ways ; but they are chiefly valuable for the oil extracted from them. At 
some seasons of the year a great part of the food of the people consists of vegetables 
cooked in this oil, eaten sometimes with and sometimes without bread. This oil is 
almost the only substance burnt for light. Olive trees are abundantly cultivated 
throughout the whole country. The fruit of the vine is the only other kind which 
can be said to form 'a substantial part of the food of the people.' Grapes come 
into season in August, and continue in season about four months. During this 
period they are used constantly, not as an agreeable dessert to stimulate and 
gratify the appetite after it has been satisfied by a substantial meal, but as a 
substantial part of the meal itself; so much so, that from August to December, 
bread and grapes are substantially the food of the people. Very thin cakes of 
bread made of flour, or of barley meal and flour mixed, and eaten with plenty of 
grapes, form the meals of the inhabitants of Lebanon morning, noon, and night. I 
may add that it is perfectly safe to eat grapes constantly to satiety. Here, too, as 
in Europe, grapes are dried in large quantities, to preserve them as raisins ; and 
in this form they supply an article of food to be used after the grape season. By 
pickling and beating a substance called dibs is made out of the grapes. It is puri- 
fied by means of lime, and is about the consistence of honey, and resembles it in 
appearance. Bread and dibs is a very common meal in winter and spring. There 
are two kinds, — one made from grapes, and the other from raisins. During the 
greater part of the grape season the regular price of the most plentiful kind, purple 
grapes, was about one farthing per pound, or fourpence per stone of fourteen 
pounds. This is the kind that I liked best to eat. Another very plentiful kind, 
the green grape, cost about sixpence per stone. A kind of very large red grapes 
sold still higher, but they were not common. To a dense population, in a dry and 
warm climate, the fruit of the vine must have been invaluable." 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 32. 

Until I come and take you away to a land like your own land, a 
land of corn and wine, a land of bread and vineyards, a land of oil 
olive and of honey, that ye may live, and not die : and hearken not 
unto Hezekiah, when he persuaded you, saying, The Lord will deliver 
us. 

A LAND OF CORN AND wine] Hebrew, eretz dahgan ve-tirosh, * a land of corn 
and vine-fruit.' The Lxx. reads, gee sitou kai oinou, 'a land of corn and wine' ; 
the V., terram fructiferam et fertilem vini, 'a fruitful land and prolific of wine.' 



94 2 KINGS, XIX. 23, 24. 

The Arabic reads vineyards. The preceding extract from Mr Robson shows how 
literally accurate is the classification of 'corn, vine-fruit, and orchard-fruit,' for the 
triad of natural productions. 

A land OF bread AND vineyards] Hebrew, eretz lekhem ukrahmim, a land 
of bread (or bread-corn = wheat) and of vineyards.' For this use of lekhem see 
Isa. xxviii. 28. 

A land OF OIL OLP7E AND of honey] Hebrew, eretz zaitkyitzkar ud^vash, 'a 
land of the olive tree (or olive fruit), of orchard fruit, and of honey.' Had Rab- 
shakeh meant to allude to olive oil he would not have used this construction, but 
shemen zaiih, 'the oil of the olive.' [See Exod. xxvii. 20; Lev. xxiv. 2.] Zaitk 
yitzhar seems designed to indicate that the olive was of or belonging to the class 
of orchard fruits which formed so large a portion of the agricultural wealth, and it 
may have been specially named as the most distinguished member of the class and 
proper representative of it. Another admissible interpretation would be to take 
yitzhar in the sense of brightness or splendor (from tzahar, to shine), and read 
' the olive of brightness (or splendor) '= the splendid or superlative olive. [As to 
devash, see Note on Gen. xliii. 11.] 



Chapter XIX. Verse 23. 

By thy messengers thou hast reproached the Lord, and hast said, 
With the multitude of my chariots I am come up to the height of the 
mountains, to the sides of Lebanon, and will cut down the tall cedar 
trees thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into 
the lodgings of his borders, and into the forest of his Carmel. 



The forest of his Carmel] Hebrew, yaar Karmillo, 'the forest of his 
garden,' = its forest like a garden. So Gesenius, — 'the nursery of trees in the 
recesses of Lebanon.' Karmel is from kerem, with the addition of el, which gives 
it a diminutive force, as Gesenius thinks ; but certainly also an intensive force, as 
in English ' darling '= little dear = very dear. Hence, as kerem signified generic- 
ally a cultivated or fruitful place, and specifically a vineyard, karmel came to denote 
also a spot peculiarly fruitful. Geres karmel (grits of the garden) is used in Lev. ii. 
14 to signify grits made from the early grain grown in the gardens. In Lev. xxiii. 
14, and 2 Kings iv. 42 karmel occurs elliptically for the complete phrase. As a 
proper name, Karmel is given to the fruitful mountainous promontory overlooking 
the Mediterranean Sea, and also to a mountain and town in the south of Judea, 
referred to I Sam. xv. 12; xxv. 5. 



Chapter XIX. Verse 24. 
I have digged and drunk strange waters, and with the sole of my 
feet have I dried up all the rivers of beseiged places. 



I have DIGGED AND DRUNK STRANGE waters] Hebrew, ani qarti ve-shah 
thithi maim zahrim, 'I have digged and drunk foreign waters,' — a boast of Sen- 
nacherib that his incursions and conquests were far extended; but some think that 
he alludes to the plan, often adopted, of diverting waters intended for the protec- 



2 KINGS, XXV. 12. 95 



tion of towns into channels dug for their reception. Others explain the words of 
deep (artesian) wells, dug by his army, whence he took water never found before. 
The only beverage which his troops required was water. It was on such a drink 
that the Saracens, in later ages, swept over the East and penetrated Spain ; and so 
well known was this habit of theirs, that when one body of imperial troops com- 
plained that they were beaten because they were not allowed wine, their commander 
caustically asked, " How -comes it, then, that your conquerors drink nothing but 
water ?" 



Chapter XIX. Verse 29. 

And this shall be a sign unto thee, Ye shall eat this year such 
things as grow of themselves, and in the second year that which 
springeth of the same ; and in the third year sow ye, and reap, and 
plant vineyards, and eat the fruits thereof. 



And plant vineyards, and eat the fruits thereof] Hebrew, ve-nitu 
kWahmim ve-iklu phirant^ 'and plant vineyards and eat their fruit.' [See Note on 
xviii. 31.] 

Chapter XXIII. Verse 9. 

Nevertheless the priests of the high places came not up to the altar 
of the Lord in Jerusalem, but they did eat of the unleavened bread 
among their brethren. 



Unleavened bread] Hebrew, matzoth, * unfermented cakes. 



Chapter XXV. Verse 12. 



But the captain of the guard left of the poor of the land to be vine- 
dressers and husbandmen. 



Vinedressers] Hebrew, le-kormim, 'as vinedressers,' from koratn, 'a vineyard- 



THE 

FIRST BOOK OF CHRONICLES. 



Chapter IX. Verse 29. 
Some of them also were appointed to oversee the vessels, and all 
the instruments of the sanctuary, and the fine flour, and the wine, and 
the oil, and the frankincense, and the spices. 



And the wine] Hebrew, ve-hay-yayin, 'and the wine.' The Lxx. has kai 
ton oinou, ' and of the wine ' ; the V., et vino, ' and with the wine.' 

And the oil] Hebrew, ve-hash-shemen. Here yayin and shemen are conjoined 
as liquids, — as tirosh and yitzhar, in numerous passages, are conjoined as solids. 



Chapter XII. Verse 40. 
Moreover they that were nigh them, even unto Issachar and Zebu- 
lun and Naphtali, brought bread on asses, and on camels, and on 
mules, and on oxen, and meat, meal, cakes of figs, and bunches of 
raisins, and wine, and oil, and oxen, and sheep abundantly : for there 
was joy in Israel. 



And bunches of raisins] Hebrew, ve-tzimmuqim, 'and raisin-clusters.' The 
Lxx. has staphidas, 'raisins'; the V., uvam passam, 'dried grapes.' 

And wine and oil] Hebrew, ve-yayin ve-shemen. The Lxx. has oinon elaion, 
'wine, olive-oil'; the V., vinum, oleum, 'wine, oil.' [See Note on ix. 29.] 



Chapter XVI. Verse 3. 
And he dealt to every one of Israel, both man and woman, to every 
one a loaf of bread, and a good piece of flesh, and a flagon of wine. 



And a flagon of wine] Hebrew, va-ashishah, 'and a raisin-cake.' The 
Lxx. reads, kai amoriteen, 'and a cake ' ; the V., etfrixam oleo similam, ' and fine 
flour fried in oil.' [See Note on parallel passage, 2 Sam. vi. 19.] 



Chapter XXIII. Verse 29. 
Both for the shewbread, and for the fine flour for meat-offering, and 
for the unleavened cakes, and for that which is baked in the pan, and 
for that which is fried, and for all manner of measure and size. 



I CHRONICLES, XXIX. 21. 97 

And for the unleavened cakes] Hebrew, ham-matzoth, ' the unfermented 
cakes.' 



Chapter XXVII. Verse 27. 

And over the vineyards was Shimei the Ramathite: over the 
increase of the vineyards for the wine cellars was Zabdi the 
Shiphmite. 



And over the vineyards] Hebrew, ve al-hak-kWahmim, 'and over the vine- 
yards.' The Lxx. has kai epi ton chorion, 'and over the fields.' Another reading 
is kai epi ton ampelonon, and over the vineyards.' The V. is vinearumque 
ctcltoribus, 'and over the cultivators of the vines.' 

Over the increase of the vineyards for the wine cellars] Hebrew, 
ve al shebak' rahmim le-otzroth hay-yayin, ' and over the increase of the vineyards 
for the stores of the wine. ' The Lxx. has epi ton theesauron ton en tois choriois tou 
oinou, 'over the treasures of wine in the fields'; the V., cellis vinariis, 'over the 
wine-cellars.' 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 21. 

And they sacrificed sacrifices unto the Lord, and offered burnt- 
offerings unto the Lord, on the morrow after that day, even a thou- 
sand bullocks, a thousand rams, and a thousand lambs, with their 
drink-offerings, and sacrifices in abundance for all Israel. 



With their drink-offerings] Hebrew, ve-naiskihen, 'and their libations.' 
So both Lxx. and V. 

13 



THE 

SECOND BOOK OF CHRONICLES. 



Chapter II. Verse io. 

And, behold, I will give to thy servants, the hewers that cut timber, 
twenty thousand measures of beaten wheat, and twenty thousand 
measures of barley, and twenty thousand baths of wine, and twenty 
thousand baths of oil. 



And twenty thousand baths of wine] Hebrew, ve-yayin batim esrim eleph 
' and wine, baths, thousands twenty. ' The bath, as a fluid measure, corresponded 
with the ephah as a dry measure, and was equal to seven gallons four pints Eng- 
lish. The Lxx. has oinou. the V. vini, 'of wine.' 



Chapter II. Verse 15. 
Now therefore the wheat and the barley, the oil, and the wine, 
which my lord hath spoken of, let him send unto his servants. 



And the wine] Hebrew, hay-yayin, 'the wine.' The Lxx. reads ton oinon; 
the V., vinitm. 



Chapter VIII. Verse 13. 
Even after a certain rate every day, offering according to the com- 
mandment of Moses, on the sabbaths, and on the new moons, and 
on the solemn feasts, three times in the year, even in the feast of 
unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of 
tabernacles. 



In the feast of unleavened bread] Hebrew, be-khag ham-matzoth, 'in the 
festival of unleavened cakes.' 



Chapter XL Verse ii. 
And he fortified the strongholds, and put captains in them, and 
store of victual, and of oil and wine. 



And of oil and wine] Hebrew, ve-shemen ve-yayin, 'and of oil and wine. 
The Lxx. has kai elaiou kai oinou ; the V., et olei et vini. 



2 CHRONICLES, XXX. 1 3. 99 

Chapter XIX. Verses 2, 3. 
2 And Jehu the son of Hanani the seer went out to meet him, and 
said to king Jehoshaphat, Shouldst thou help the ungodly, and love 
them that hate the Lord ? therefore is wrath upon thee from before 
the Lord. 3 Nevertheless there are good things found in thee. 



A principle of the broadest kind is here enunciated, which should be applied to 
the practical life of professed Christians. The vice of Jehoshaphat was that of 
moral weakness, his virtue that of ready repentance under the perception of truth. 
A great brewer has truly said that the contest between church and school on the 
one hand, and that of the beer-shop and gin-palace on the other, is but one 
development of the war continually waged between heaven and hell. It surely 
would be wise in all persons of influence — especially ministers, magistrates, and 
members of Parliament — to put to themselves this question of Jehu the seer, — 
"Shouldest thou help the ungodly, and love them that hate the Lord?" Were 
they honestly to do this, should we ever behold the moral anomaly of men in 
authority presiding over the feasts of publicans, and giving toasts in honor of a 
deadly and demoralizing trade ? 



Chapter XXVI. Verse 10. 

Also he built towers in the desert, and digged many wells : for he 
had much cattle, both in the low country, and in the plains : husband- 
men also, and vinedressers in the mountains, and in Carmel : for he 
loved husbandry. 



And vinedressers in the mountains, and in Carmel] Hebrew, ve-kormim 
behahrim uvak-karmel, 'and vinedressers in the mountains and in the fruitful 
place.' Margin of A. V., 'fruitful field.' [See Note on 2 Kings xix. 23.] 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 35. 

And also the burnt offerings were in abundance, with the fat of the 
peace-offerings, and of the drink-offerings for every burnt-offering. So 
the service of the house of the Lord was set in order. 



And of the drink-offerings] Hebrew, uvan-nesakim, 'and with the liba- 
tions.' The Lxx. has ton spondon, 'of the outpourings'; the V., libamina, 
'libations.' 



Chapter XXX. Verse 13. 

And there assembled at Jerusalem much people to keep the feast 
of unleavened bread in the second month, a very great congregation. 



The feast of unleavened bread] Hebrew, etk-khag ham-matzoth, 'the 
festival of unfermented cakes.' 



100 2 CHRONICLES, XXXII. 28. 

Chapter XXX. Verse 21. 
And the children of Israel that were present at Jerusalem kept the 
feast of unleavened bread seven days with great gladness : and the 
Levites and the priests praised the Lord day by day, singing with 
loud instruments unto the Lord. 



The feast of unleavened bread] Hebrew, eth-khag ham-matzoth, 'the 
festival of unfermented cakes.' 



Chapter XXXI. Verse 5. 
And as soon as the commandment came abroad, the children of 
Israel brought in abundance the firstfruits of corn, wine, and oil, and 
honey, and of all the increase of the field ; and the tithe of all 
brought they in abundantly. 



The firstfruits of corn, wine, and oil, and honey] Hebrew, rashith, 
dahgan, tirosh, ve-yitzkar, u-cPvask, ' the firsts of corn, vine-fruit, olive-and-orchard 
fruit, and honey.' The margin of the A. V. gives ' dates ' as the alternative reading 
for 'honey,' as it is not probable that the fruit of the palm tree was exempt from 
this tithing. The Lxx. has aparcheen sitou, kai oinou, kai elaiou, kai mellitos, 
'the first of corn, and wine, and oil, and honey.' The V. has primitias frumenti, 
etvini, et olei, et mellis, 'the firsts of corn, and of wine, and of oil, and of honey.' 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 28. 
Storehouses also for the increase of corn, and wine, and oil ; and 
stalls for all manner of beasts, and cotes for flocks. 



Of corn, and wine, and oil] Hebrew, dahgan, ve-tirosh, ve-yitzhar, ' (the 
increase of) corn, and vine-fruit, and olive-and-orchard fruit.' The Lxx. has sitou, 
oinou, kai elaiou; the V, frumenti, vini, et olei, 'of corn, of wine, and of oil.' 






THE BOOK OF EZRA, 



Chapter III. Verse 7. 
They gave money also unto the masons, and to the carpenters; 
and meat, and drink, and oil, unto them of Zidon, and to them of 
Tyre, to bring cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea of Joppa, accord- 
ing to the grant that they had of Cyrus king of Persia. 



And meat, and drink, and oil] Hebrew, u-mdakal, u-mishteh, vah-shemen, 
'and food, and drink, and oil.' The kind of mishteh is not stated. The Lxx., 
kai bromaiai kai pota, kai elaion, ' and meats, and drinks, and oil ' ; the V., cibum, 
etpotum, et oleum, * victuals, and drink, and oil. ' 



Chapter VI. Verse 9. 
And that which they have need of, both young bullocks, and rams, 
and lambs, for the burnt offerings of the God of heaven, wheat, salt, 
wine, and oil, according to the appointment of the priests which are 
at Jerusalem, let it be given them day by day without fail. 



Wine and oil] This verse being part of a decree written in Chaldee, the original 
is khamar — ' foaming juice,' corresponding to the Hebrew khemer in Deut. xxxii. 14 
— u-meshakh, 'oil.' The Lxx. has oinon kai elaion ; the V., vinum et oleum. 



Chapter VI. Verse 22. 
And kept the feast of unleavened bread seven days with joy : for 
the Lord had made them joyful, and turned the heart of the king of 
Assyria unto them, to strengthen their hands in the work of the house 
of God, the God of Israel. 



The feast of unleavened bread] Hebrew, khag matzoth, 'festival of unfer- 
mented-cakes. ' 



Chapter VII. Verse 17. 
That thou mayest buy speedily with this money bullocks, rams, 
lambs, with their meat-offerings and their drink-offerings, and offer 
them upon the altar of the house of your God which is in Jerusalem. 



And their drink-offerings] Hebrew, ve-niskaihon, 'and their libations. 



102 EZRA, X. 6. 



Chapter VII. Verse 22. 
Unto an hundred talents of silver, and to an hundred measures of 
wheat, and to an hundred baths of wine, and to an hundred baths of 
oil, and salt without prescribing how much. 



And to an hundred baths of wine] Chaldee, ve-ad khamar batin ineah, 
'and to wine, baths a hundred.' The Lxx. gives kai heds oinou baton hekaton, 
* and even to a hundred measures of wine ' ; the V., et usqtte ad vini batos centum, 
'and even to a hundred baths of wine.' [See Note on 2 Chron. ii. 10.] 

Without prescribing how much] Properly, without measure or stint — 
according to pleasure or convenience. 



Chapter X. Verse 6. 
Then Ezra rose up from before the house of God, and went into 
the chamber of Johanan the son of Eliashib : and when he came 
thither, he did eat no bread, nor drink water : for he mourned because 
of the transgression of them that had been carried away. 



Nor drink water] Hebrew, u-maim lo shahthah, 'and water he drank not.' 
To abstain willingly from bread and water was Ezra's manner of expressing grief; 
to be confined to bread and water would be to many persons one of the greatest 
miseries of life. To control the appetite, not to pamper it, is the surest means of 
promoting both health and rational enjoyment. Temperance, in fact, is never 
reached until self-denial begins. 



THE BOOK OF NEHEMIAH. 



Chapter I. Verse ii. 

O Lord, I beseech thee, let now thine ear be attentive to the 
prayer of thy servant, and to the prayer of thy servants, who desire 
to fear thy name : and prosper, I pray thee, thy servant this day, and 
grant him mercy in the sight of this man. For I was the king's cup- 
bearer. 



For I WAS THE king's cupbearer] Hebrew, va-ani hah-yithi mashqeh lam- 
melek, 'and I was cup-bearer to the king.' Mashqeh, the participle of shah-qah 
'to drink,' signifies, being in the Hiphil conjugation, 'one who gives drink to 
another '= a cup-bearer. The Lxx. has oinochoos, 'wine pourer'; the V., 
pincerna, 'a cup-bearer.' Mashqeh is also translated 'butier ' by the A. V. [See 
Note on Gen. xl. 9.] 

Chapter II. Verse i. 

And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of 
Artaxerxes the king, that wine was before him : and I took up the 
wine, and gave it unto the king. Now I had not been beforetime sad 
in his presence. 

Wine was before him] Hebrew, yayin le-phahnahv, 'wine (was) before his 
face.' The Lxx. gives kai een ho oinos enopion emou, ' and the wine was before 
me' ; the V., et vinum erat ante eum, ' and wine was before him.' 

And I TOOK up the wine] Hebrew, vah esah eth hay -yayin, ' and I lifted up 
the wine.' The Lxx. has kai elabon ton oinon, 'and I took the wine'; the V., 
levavi vinum, ' I raised the wine. ' 



The office of cup-bearer to an Eastern monarch was one of much importance, 
from the frequent access it gave to his presence at a time when he would be most 
inclined to unbend and grant favors ; but the constant dread of treason in which 
such a despot perpetually lived, rendered him acutely observant of the slightest 
change of demeanor in this attendant. Artaxerxes would, therefore, notice 
Nehemiah's sadness, and be anxious as to its cause (chap. ii. 2). It has been sup- 
posed that in his self-absorption Nehemiah had omitted the indispensable form of 
pouring a little wine into his own hand and drinking it before presenting the cup 
to the king; and this omission of the usual protection against poisoning would 
naturally arouse the monarch's suspicion, and help us to understand why Nehemiah 
was made ' very sore afraid' by the king's interrogation. 



104 NEHEMIAH, V. 3, II, 15, 18. 

Chapter III. Verse 14. 
But the dung gate repaired Malchiah the son of Rechab, the ruler 
of part of Beth-haccerem; he built it, and set up the doors thereof, 
the locks thereof, and the bars thereof. 



Beth-haccerem] Hebrew, baith-hak-kahrem, ' the house of the vineyard ' ; also 
a town referred to in Jer. vi. 1, and situated, according to Jerome, on a mountain 
between Jerusalem and Tekoa. 



Chapter V. Verse 3. 
Some also there were that said, We have mortgaged our lands, vine- 
yards, and houses, that we might buy corn, because of the dearth. 



And vineyards] Hebrew, u-k'rahmainu, 'and our vineyards.' See also in 
verses 4, 5. 

Chapter V. Verse ii. 
Restore, I pray you, to them, even this day, their lands, their vine- 
yards, their oliveyards, and their houses, also the hundredth part of 
the money, and of the corn, the wine, and the oil, that ye exact of 
them. 



Their vineyards] Hebrew, karmaihem, 'their vineyards.' 
And of the corn, the wine, and the oil] Hebrew, ve-kad-dahgan, hat- 
tirosh, ve-hay-yitzhar, ' and the corn, the vine-fruit, and the olive-and-orchard 
fruit,' — obviously enumerated as the solid produce of the 'lands,' 'vineyards,' and 
' oliveyards ' just mentioned. The Lxx. has ton siton kai ton oinon kai to elaion, 
'the corn, and the wine, and the oil ' ; the V., frumenti, vini, et olei, ' of corn, of 
wine, and of oil.' The Arabic for tirosh has the usual etzer, ' expressed juice.' 



Chapter V. Verse 15. 
But the former governors that had been before me were chargeable 
unto the people, and had taken of them bread and wine, beside forty 
shekels of silver; yea, even their servants bare rule over the people; 
but so did not I, because of the fear of God. 



Bread and wine] Hebrew, be-lekhem vah-yayin, ' from bread and wine. ' The 
Lxx. has en artoiskai en oino, 'with loaves and with wine ' ; the V., in pane etvino, 
'with bread and wine.' 



Chapter V. Verse 18. 
Now that which was prepared for me daily was one ox and six 
choice sheep ; also fowls were prepared for me, and once in ten days 
store of all sorts of wine : yet for all this required not I the bread of 
the governor, because the bondage was heavy upon this people. 



Store of all sorts of wine] Hebrew, be-kahl yayin le-harba, ' with every 
(sort of) wine abundantly ' = a copious supply of all kinds of wine. The Lxx. 



NEHEMIAH, VIII. IO, 12. 105 

has en pasin oinos to pleethei, 'wine in all (kinds) in plenty ' ; the V., vina diversa, 
'different wines.' 



, No fact is better established in regard to ancient times than the great diversity 
of their vinous preparations, — a diversity extending not only to the modes of their 
manufacture, but to their qualities and effects. Though Pliny cannot be quoted 
as an illustrator of Oriental customs prevailing five hundred years before, yet when 
he affirmed that a hundred and ninety-five varieties of wine existed in his time,* 
and that these would be doubled if lesser differences were included, we may safely 
conclude that the kahl yayin of Nehemiah is to be liberally construed. Some might 
be new, some old ; some pure, some mixed ; some fresh from the vat, some boiled ; 
some watery, some thick ; some sweet as honey, others thin and tart. The modes 
of manufacture would also differ in almost every district, and probably among 
neighboring vine-growers. [See Virgil's poetic hyperbole in 'Georgics,' lib. iii. 
IO3-8; and observation of Sir G. Wilkinson quoted in Note on Gen. xl. 9 — 11.] 



Chapter VIII. Verse 10. 
Then he said unto them, Go your way, eat the fat, and drink the 
sweet, and send portions unto them for whom nothing is prepared : 
for this day is holy unto our Lord : neither be ye sorry ; for the joy 
of the Lord is your strength. 



And drink the sweet] Hebrew, ushthu mamtaqqim, ' and drink the sweet- 
nesses ' = sweet drinks. The Lxx. has kai piete glukasmata, ' and drink ye sweet 
things ' ; the V., et bibite mulsum, 'and drink ye the honey-sweet (article).' * 



Some of the ancient wines were thick and luscious like jellies, and had to be 
largely diluted before they could be drunk ; others, of the ordinary fluidity, were 
mixed in the proportion of several measures of water to one of grape-juice, so that 
even if fermented they were but slightly intoxicating unless consumed in large 
quantities. The verbal root of mamtiqqim is mathaq, 'to suck,' 'to be sweet 1 ; 
and, says the Rev. B. Parsons, "it is worthy of remark that the ancient Britons 
had a sweet wine which the Welsh called meddyglyn, and the English metheglin. 
The word metheglin comes from metteg or mettek, 'sweet,' and glyn, 'glutinous,' 
and thus signifies what it really was, a sweet syrupy drink. Every one must here 
see that metheg in Saxon, meddyg in Welsh, and mettek in Hebrew are the same 
words. This term among the ancient Britons was applied to a drink made from 
honey." To the same root may be referred methuo and methusko, ' to fill or drink 
to the full' of (or with) any sweet thing; but meth in Egyptian also signified 
' full,' as in metheris, the mother God. 



Chapter VIII. Verse 12. 
And all the people went their way to eat, and to drink, and to 
send portions, and to make great mirth, because they had understood 
the words that were declared unto them. 

* See Appendix ' D ' for his exact words ; and also for description of mulsum. 

14 



106 NEHEMIAH, X. 37, 39. 

And to drink] Hebrew, ve-leshtoth, 'and to drink.' The Lxx. has kaipiein, 
'and to drink' j the V., et biberet, 'and that (the people) should drink.' 



Chapter IX. Verse 25. 
And they took strong cities, and a fat land, and possessed houses 
full of all goods, wells digged, vineyards, and oliveyards, and fruit 
trees in abundance; so they did eat, and were filled, and became 
fat, and delighted themselves in thy great goodness. 



Vineyards] Hebrew, kerahmim, 'vineyards.' 



Chapter X. Verse 37. 
And that we should bring the firstfruits of our dough, and our 
offerings, and the fruit of all manner of trees, of wine and of oil, 
unto the priests, to the chambers of the house of our God ; and the 
tithes of our ground unto the Levites, that the same Levites might 
have the tithes in all the cities of our tillage. 



And the fruit op all manner of trees] Hebrew, u-phri kahl atz, 'and 
the fruit of every (kind of) tree.' The Lxx. reads, kai ton karpon pantos xulou, 
' and the fruit of every tree ' ; the V., et poma omnis ligni, ' and fruits of every tree.' 

Of wine and of oil] Hebrew, tirosh ve-yitzhar, 'vine-fruit and olive and 
orchard fruit.' The Lxx. has oinou kai elaiou, 'of wine and of oil'; the V., 
vinde??iice qitoque et olei, 'of vintage fruit also and of oil.' This is the second 
instance in which the Vulgate does justice to tirosh. [See Note on Deut. vii. 13.] 
Walton's Polyglot gives musti. Tirosh and yitzhar are plainly mentioned by 
Nehemiah as representatives of the ' fruit of all manner of trees ' brought to the 
priests ; and this verse alone is sufficient to establish the meaning of these collective 
terms, as designating the solid produce of the vineyard and the orchard. 



Chapter X. Verse 39. 
For the children of Israel and the children of Levi shall bring the 
offering of the corn, of the new wine, and the oil, unto the chambers, 
where are the vessels of the sanctuary, and the priests that minister, 
and the porters, and the singers : and we will not forsake the house 
of our God. 



Of the corn, of the new wine, and the oil] Hebrew, ha-dahgan, hat- 
tirosh, ve-hay -yitzhar, 'the corn, the vine-fruit, and the olive and orchard fruit.' 
The Lxx. reads, tou sitou, kai ton oinou, kai ton elaiou, ' of the corn, and of the 
wine, and of the oil.' The V. has frumenti, vini, et olei, ' of corn, of wine, and of 
oil,' — so soon had St Jerome unlearnt what he had practised in verse 37, where he 
translates tirosh as vindemice. The English translators add ' new ' to their usual 
rendering of tirosh as 'wine.' 



NEHEMIAH, XIII. 5, 12, 1 5. 107 

Chapter XIII. Verse 5. 

And he had prepared for him a great chamber, where aforetime 
they laid the meat offerings, the frankincense, and the vessels, and 
the tithes of the corn, the new wine, and the oil, which was com- 
manded to be given to the Levites, and the singers, and the porters ; and 
the offerings of the priests. 

And the tithes of the corn, the new wine, and the oil] Hebrew, 
u-mdasar had-dahgan hat-tirosh ve-hay-yitzhar, 'and the tithe of the corn, the 
vine-fruit, and the orchard fruit.' The Lxx. reads, kai teen dekateen tou sitou, kai 
tou oinon, kai tou elaiou, * and the tenth of the corn, and of the wine, and of the 
oil'; the V., et decimatn frumenti, vini, et olei, 'and the tenth of corn, of wine, 
and of oil.' The English translators again render tiros A by 'new wine,' following, 
no doubt, the mustum of most Continental versions. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 12. 

Then brought all Judah the tithe of the corn and the new wine and 
the oil unto the treasuries. 



The tithe of the corn and the new wine and the oil] Hebrew, mdasar 
had-dahgan, hat-tirosh, v' hay-yitzhar, ' the tithe of the corn, the vine-fruit, and 
the orchard-fruit.' The Lxx. gives tou purou, kai tou oinou, kai tou elaiou, 'of 
the wheat, and the wine, and the oil' ; the V.,frumenti, vini, et olei. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 15. 

In those days saw I in Judah some treading wine-presses on the 
sabbath, and bringing in sheaves, and lading asses; as also wine, 
grapes, and figs, and all manner of burdens, which they brought into 
Jerusalem on the sabbath day : and I testified against them in the day 
wherein they sold victuals. 

Treading wine presses] Hebrew, dorkim gitoth, 'treading the wine-presses.' 
The Lxx. has patountas leenous ; the V., calcantes torcularia. 

As also wine, grapes] Hebrew, vl-aph yayin anahvim, 'and also wine, 
grapes.' The Lxx. has kai oinon kai staphuleen, 'and wine and grapes'; the 
V., vinum et uvas, 'wine and grapes.' 



THE BOOK OF ESTHER, 



Chapter I. Verse 7. 
And they gave them drink in vessels of gold (the vessels being 
diverse one from another), and royal wine in abundance, according to 
the state of the king. 



The Hebrew is ve-hashqoth biklai zahahv, ve-kalim mikkalim shonim, vZ-yayn 
malkuth rahv ke-yad ham-melek, 'and they were providing drink in vessels of gold, 
and the vessels (were) diverse from vessels, and wine of royalty (was) abundant, 
according to the hand of the king.' The Syriac follows the Hebrew almost word 
for word. The Lxx. reads, poteeria chrusa kai argura, kai anthrakinon kulikion 
prokeimenon apo talanton trismurion ; oinos polus kai heedus hon autos ho basileus 
epinen, ' gold and silver drinking-cups (there were), and a small carbuncle goblet 
was on view, valued at thirty thousand talents ; the wine (was) plentiful and sweet, 
such as was drunk by the king himself.' The V. gives bibebant autem qui invitati 
erant aureis poculis, et aliis vasis cibis inferebantur ; vinum quoque ut magni- 
ficentia regid dignum erat, abundans, et prczcipuum ponebatur, ' but they that 
were invited drank in golden cups, and the meats were brought in different sets of 
vessels ; wine also worthy of the royal magnificence was furnished in abundance, 
and of the highest quality.' 

The Targumist tells a strange story, how the vessels brought from Jerusalem 
turned the king's vessels into the likeness of lead ! — and adds, "And they drank 
fresh wine (khamar-ahsis), fit for the drinking of a king, of a superior scent and 
the most delicious flavor; and it was not used sparingly, but with the liberality of a 
royal hand." 

This was a splendid entertainment. The drinking-vessels were of gold, and of 
different patterns, or perhaps variously chased; the wine was 'wine of royalty,' 
i. <?. such as was usually drunk by the royal family ; and it was plentifully served 
1 according to the king's hand ' — with a profusion suitable to the hand of one whose 
resources were so vast. The statement of the Lxx. that it was 'sweet,' throws 
light upon the kind of wine preferred, if not in the Persian palace, yet in courtly 
circles in the time when that translation was made — the third century before Christ. 
Sweetness, not alcoholic potency^ was the quality most relished, as it would appear, 
in the wines then selected for the royal tables. 



ESTHER, I. 8. 109 



Chapter I. Verse 8. 
And the drinking was according to the law ; none did compel : for 
so the king had appointed to all the officers of his house, that they 
should do according to every man's pleasure. 



The Hebrew reads, ve-hashthiah kad-dath, ain onas, ki-kan yissad ham-melek al 
kahl-rahv baitho laashoth kirtzon ish vah-isk, ' and the drinking (was) according to 
a decree — none compelling, for so the king commanded to every officer of his 
house to fulfill the pleasures of man ' (= every man). 

The Lxx. rendering is ho de potos outos ou kata prokeimenon nomon egeneto, outos 
de eetheleesen ho basileus, kai epetaxe tots oikonomois poieesai to theleema autou kai 
ton anthropon, ' now the drinking was not according to the established law, for so 
the king wished ; and he instructed those of his household to do the will of himself 
and of the men ' (his guests). 

The V. has nee erat qui nolentes cogeret ad bibendum ; sed sicut rex statuerat, 
prceponens mensis singulos de principibus suis ut sumeret unusquisque quod vellit, 
' nor did any one force the unwilling to drink, but as the king had arranged, who 
set over each table one of his lords, that every one might partake of what he 
pleased.' 

The Targum has ' and the drinking was regulated according to the bodily habit, 
and there was no one who compelled (another to drink) ; for the king had so issued 
an order binding upon every one connected with the royal house, that the drinking 
should be according to the will of each, whether Israelites or of any other nation 
and language. ' 

Josephus gives the following account : — ' And he enjoined upon his servants not 
to compel them to drink by constantly presenting the drink to them, as was a 
custom among the Persians, but to defer to them, and kindly attend to whatever 
each of the guests should desire ' (kai pros ho bouletai ton katakeimenon hekastds 
pkilophrenesthai). 



The apparent contradiction between the Hebrew text and the Lxx. version, will 
disappear if we observe that the king, in fact, superseded pro tempore the common 
convivial law by a special arrangement for the occasion ; but whether for the sake 
of increasing or diminishing the drinking is not clear. Josephus implies the latter ; 
but while the abstemious would be protected by the freedom afforded, those of a 
different disposition might make it the means of unbounded license. Among the 
Greeks and Romans each banqueting party had its president (Greek, sumposi- 
archees — chief of the feast ; Roman, arbiter sive rex bibendi — master or king of the 
drinking), and all the persons present were bound to follow his directions in the 
quaffing of cups in honor of gods and mortals. The rule was precise and per- 
emptory— -pithi ee apithi, 'drink or depart.' The Persians may have had a more 
familiar custom of toasting one another. Herodotus, who lived not long after 
Nehemiah, says of them, "They are very fond of wine, and drink it in large quan- 
tities. It is also their general practice to deliberate upon affairs of weight when 
they are drunk ; and then on the morrow, when they are sober, the decision to 
which they came the night previous is put before them by the master of the house in 
which it was made : and if it is then approved of they act upon it ; if not, they set 



110 ESTHER, II. 1 8. 



it aside. Sometimes, however, they are sober at their first deliberations, but in 
this case they always reconsider the matter under the influence of wine." — (Book 
i., c. 133.) The Germans, according to Tacitus, adopted the first and better half 
of this curious method. They took counsel first when drunk, and then when sober. 
And the historian adds, " They deliberate when unable to devise anything, they 
decide when not able to go wrong." 



Chapter I. Verse 9. 

Also Vashti the queen made a feast for the women in the royal 
house which belonged to king Ahasuerus. 



A feast] Hebrew, mishteh, ' a drinking '=a banquet. It is not to be sup- 
posed that a mishteh comprised drinking only ; it certainly included the more sub- 
stantial delicacies of the season. Queen Vashti's mishteh would be composed of 
refreshments adapted to the taste of her ladies, and let us hope that the drinks, 
whatever else they were, were of a more innocent nature than those with which her 
royal consort and his nobles were regaled. 



Chapter I. Verse 10, 11. 

10 On the seventh day, when the heart of the king was merry 
with wine, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, and 
Abagtha, Zethar, and Carcas, the seven chamberlains that served in 
the presence of Ahasuerus the king, u To bring Vashti the queen 
before the king with the crown royal, to show the people and the 
princes her beauty : for she was fair to look on. 



When the heart of the king was merry with wine] Hebrew, ke-tov lav 
ham-melek hay-yayin, 'when good (was) the heart of the king with wine.' The 
Lxx. reads, heedeos genomenos ho basileus, ' the king having got into a sweet con- 
dition ' = a mellow humor. The V. amplifies, cum rex esset hilarior et post 
niniiam potationem incaZuisset meto, 'when the king had become more jovial, and 
after an excessive indulgence had become heated with unmixed (wine).' The 
T. reads, 'when the king's heart was gladdened with wine, the Lord sent to him 
the angel of confusion to confound their feast.' 



Subsequent events make apparent — I, how little of good judgment is joined with 
drinking-jollity ; 2, how soon the blandness of temper that seems associated with 
the bottle turns to sourness when crossed by opposition. The free and easy spirits 
that spring from drink resemble the paws of the tiger, which conceal under a 
smooth and velvety fur the talons of violence and rapine. Where Bacchus rules, 
mirth may turn at any moment into murderous strife. 



Chapter II. Verse 18. 

Then the king made a great feast unto all his princes and his 
servants, even Esther's feast; and he made a release to the provinces, 
and gave gifts, according to the state of the king. 



ESTHER, VII. I, 2. Ill 



A great feast] Hebrew, mishteh gahdol, 'a great feast.' 

Even Esther's feast] Hebrew, eth-mishta Estar, ' the feast of Esther ' — 
called Esther's because given in her honor, to signalize her elevation to the 
queenly state and dignity. 



Chapter III. Verse 15. 

The posts went out, being hastened by the king's commandment, 
and the decree was given in Shushan the palace. And the king and 
Hainan sat down to drink ; but the city Shushan was perplexed. 



Sat down to drink] Hebrew, yahshvu lisktosh, ' sat down to drink.' 

The Lxx. has ekothonizonto. ' were drinking deep ' [from kot/wn, a Spartan 

drinking-cup ; hence to kdthonizein=. to drink on and on]. The V. has celebrante 

conviviuni, ' keeping a feast.' 

We are almost compelled to think that Ahasuerus was drunk when he fell so 
blindly into the snare laid for him by Haman. Matthew Henry remarks, " Haman 
was afraid lest the king's conscience should smite him; to prevent which he 
engrossed him to himself, and kept him drinking : this cursed method many take 
to drown their convictions and harden their own and others' hearts in sin." 



Chapter V. Verse 6. 

And the king said unto Esther at the banquet of wine, What is thy 
petition ? and it shall be granted thee : and what is thy request ? even 
to the half of the kingdom it shall be performed. 



At the banquet of wine] Hebrew, bemishta hay -y ay in, ' at the banquet of 
the wine.' 

\_Mishteh occurs in verses 4, 5, 12, and 14, and is in each place rendered ' ban- 
quet ' in the A. V. ] 

Chapter VII. Verse i. 
So the king and Haman came to banquet with Esther the 
queen. 



Came TO banquet] Hebrew, lishtoth, 'to drink.' So the margin of A. V. 
The Lxx. has sumpiein, 'to drink with'; the V., ut biberent, 'that they might 
drink.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 2. 

And the king said again unto Esther on the second day at the 
banquet of wine, What is thy petition, queen Esther ? and it shall be 
granted thee : and what is thy request ? and it shall be performed, 
even to the half of the kingdom. 



112 ESTHER, IX. 22. 



At the banquet of wine] Hebrew, be-mishta hay-yayin, 'at the drink- 
ing (== feast) of the wine.' The Lxx. has en to poto, 'at the drinking'; the V., 
postquam vino incaluerat, ' after he was heated with wine.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 7. 

And the king arising from the banquet of wine in his wrath went 
into the palace garden : and Haman stood up to make request for his 
life to Esther the queen ; for he saw that there was evil determined 
against him by the king. 



FROM the banquet of wine] Hebrew, mim-mishtdb hay-yayin. The Lxx. 
has apo tou sumposiou, 'from the banquet'; the V., de loco convivii, 'from the 
place of feasting.' 



Chapter IX. Verse 22. 



As the days wherein the Jews rested from their enemies, and the 
month which was turned unto them from sorrow to joy, and from 
mourning into a good day: that they should make them days of 
feasting and joy, and of sending portions one to another, and gifts to 
the poor. 



Of feasting] Hebrew, mishteh. [So also in verses 17, 18, and 19, where it is 
rendered ' feasting ' in A. V. ] If intoxicating liquors were freely used, the feast 
of Purim would prove in its results to many families a time of sorrow rather than of 
joy. The Jews both of the East and West have a general reputation for sobriety, 
but that Purim is not always soberly celebrated, even in the Holy City, may be 
gathered from an anecdote related by the teacher of the English school in Jerusalem, 
to the effect that a girl who was asked why she would be absent on account of 
Purim, as she alleged she must be, replied with much simplicity, 'We shall all 
be drunk.' It would be a relief to hope that the error was purely grammatical, 
and that the little Jewish maiden was confounding the active ' to drink ' with the 
passive ' to be drunk ' ; but we can hardly please ourselves with this supposition 
when we recollect the teaching and testimony of the ancient Rabbins — "A man's 
duty with regard to this feast is that he should eat meat . . . and drink wine 
until he be drunk, and fall asleep in his drunkenness" (Hilkhoth Megillah, c. ii. 
5). In fol. 7 the Talmud is even more precise : — "A man is bound to get so 
drunk with wine at Purim as not to know the difference between Cursed is Haman 
and Blessed is Mordecai." A curious story is appended. "Rabba and Rabbi 
Zira made their Purim entertainment together. When Rabba got drunk he 
arose and killed Rabbi Zira. On the next day he prayed for mercy, and God 
restored Zira to life. The following year Rabba again proposed to Rabbi Zira 
to have their Purim entertainment together ; but he answered, ' Miracles don't 
happen every day.'" This is only one out of a multitude of instances demon- 
strating the absurdity of Christian commentators and critics appealing to the 
'opinions' of the Rabbins; only in matters of fact is their testimony of any 
real value. 



THE BOOK OF JOB. 



Chapter I. Verse 4. 
And his sons went and feasted in their houses, every one his day ; 
and sent and called for their three sisters to eat and to drink with 
them. 



And feasted] Hebrew, vl-ahsu misteh, 'and made a drinking '= feast. The 
Lxx. has epoiousan poton, 'they made a drinking' ; the V., etfaciebant convivium, 
' and they made a feast.' 

And to drink] Hebrew, ve-lishtoth, 'and to drink.' 



This ' drinking ' or feast is not explained. The proceeding of the patriarch, as 
described in ver. 5, who, when the days of his sons' feasting were over, " rose up 
early, and offered burnt offerings according to the number of them all, lest they 
should have sinned in their hearts," may suggest, but does not necessarily imply, 
that their ' wine ' was of the class described by the Wise man as 'a mocker.' The 
words, 'thus did Job continually,' show that the previous account relates to the 
festivities which recurred on the birthday of each son and daughter. 



Chapter I. Verse 13. 
And there was a day when his sons and his daughters were eating 
and drinking wine in their eldest brother's house. 



Drinking WINE] Hebrew, shothim yayin, 'drinking wine.' The Lxx. has 
epinon oinon, 'they drank wine'; the V., biberent vinum, '(when) they might 
drink wine.' 



Chapter I. Verse 18. 
While he was yet speaking, there came also another, and said, Thy 
sons and thy daughters were eating and drinking wine in their eldest 
brother's house. 



And DRINKING WINE] Hebrew, ve-shothim yayin, 'and drinking wine.' The 
Lxx. has pinonton, 'drinking'; the V., bibentibus vinum, 'when drinking wine. y 
The Syriac omits all mention of wine in verses 13 and 18. 
15 



ii4 JOB, xxiv. 6. 



Chapter XII. Verse 25. 
They grope in the dark without light, and he maketh them to 
stagger like a drunken man. 

And he maketh them to stagger like a drunken man] Hebrew, vay- 
yatham kish-shikkor, 'and causes them to stray like one drunk.' The Lxx. has 
planeetheieesan de hosper ho methuon, 'and they wander as one drunk.' Some 
MSS. have planomenous, 'wandering.' The V. reads, et errare eos faciei quasi 
ebrios, 'and he shall make them to wander as if drunk.' So the Syriac. The 
idea is of going astray rather than of staggering — the mental confusion which mis- 
leads, rather than the physical unsteadiness produced by indulgence in strong 
liquor. For the latter condition the Hebrew is rahal. 



Chapter XV. Verse 33. 
He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine, and shall cast off 
his flower as the olive. 



He shall shake off his unripe grape as the vine] Hebrew, yakhmos 
kag-gephen bisro, ' he shall shake off as the vine his sour bunch (of grapes)' — from 
baser or boser, a collective noun used to describe 'sour grapes.' Lxx., trugee- 
theiee de hds ompkax pro horas, ' he shall be gathered as an unripe grape before (its) 
hour.' V., Icedetur quasi vinea in primo flore botrus ejus, 'he shall be broken 
(or blasted) as a vine in the first flower of its grape-cluster.' 



Chapter XXII. Verse 7. 
Thou hast not given water to the weary to drink, and thou hast 
with-holden bread from the hungry. 



To withhold water from the thirsty (Hebrew, ah-iph = languishing), was and is 
regarded in the East as an act of monstrous inhumanity. It is one of the thirty-two 
' charities ' of the Hindoos to have water ready for the weary traveler to drink. 
Persons in England who give to the thirsty or weary workman beer, or other intoxi- 
cating liquor, are unconsciously doing evil instead of good : first, by presenting 
that which increases thirst ; and secondly, by creating a desire for stimulants which 
leads to a waste of wages and to much domestic suffering. If other drinks besides 
water are offered, let them be free from the power of injuring the recipient, either 
in body or mind. 

Chapter XXIV. Verse 6. 
They reap every one his corn in the field : and they gather the 
vintage of the wicked. 

And they gather the vintage of the wicked] Hebrew, ve-kerem 
rahshah yelaqqashu, ' and the vineyard of the wicked one they glean ' [or gather the 
late fruits of]. The margin of the A. V. has ' the wicked gather the vintage.' The 
Lxx. has adunatoi ampelonas asebon amisihi kai asiti eirgasanto, ' the feeble cultivate 



JOB, XXXII. 19. 115 



unpaid and unfed, the vineyards of the unjust.' The V. reads, et vineam ejus quern 
vi oppresserint, vindemiant, * and they gather the vintage of his vineyard whom by 
force they have oppressed.' 



Chapter XXIV. Verse ii. 
Which make oil within their walls, and tread their winepresses, and 
suffer thirst. 



And tread their winepresses, and suffer thirst] Hebrew, yikahvim 
dahrkuvay-yitzmahu, 'and tread their wine-presses and thirst.' The Lxx. has 
nothing resembling this verse. The V. rendering is inter acervos eorum meridiati 
sunt, qui calcatis torcularibus sitiunt, ' among their heaps those who thirst take a 
noonday rest, the wine-presses having been trodden."* 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 18. 
He is swift as the waters ; their portion is cursed in the earth : he 
beholdeth not the way of the vineyards. 



He beholdeth not the way of the vineyards] Hebrew, lo yiphneh 
derek kerahmim, 'he turns not to [= looks not towards] the way of the vine- 
yards.' The Lxx. strangely gives the whole verse thus: — "Swift is (their path) 
upon the face of water ; accursed shall be their portion upon earth, and their fruits 
upon the land (shall be) withered in their arm, for they have robbed orphans." t 
The V. translates the last clause nee ai?ibulet per viam vinearum, ' nor shall he 
walk along the path of the vineyards'; the T., 'and he shall not look to the 
footpath of the vineyards.' The Syriac and Arabic connect the last two clauses in 
this form, — 'accursed will be their portion in the earth in the way of the vine- 
yards.' Assuming the integrity of the Hebrew text, the meaning will be, either 
that the rapacious will shun the publicity of the vineyard path, or (more likely) 
disdain the honest labor of those who go to and from the vineyard as the sphere 
of their daily toil. 

Chapter XXXII. Verse 19. 
Behold, my belly is as wine which hath no vent; it is ready to 
burst like new bottles. 



The Hebrew reads, hinna vitni ke-yayin lo yip-pahthaakh ; ke-ovoth khadahshim 
yibbahqaa, ' behold, my belly like wine has no vent ; like new bottles it is rent. ' 

* Prof. Reran translates, — 

" lis expriment Phuile dans les celliers de leur spoliateur, 
En foulant le pressoir, ils ont soif." 
t Prof. Renan translates, — 

" Ils sont comme un corps leger sur la surface de l'eau, - 
Leur heritage est maudit sur la terre ; 
Ils ne prennent jamais le chemin des vignes ;" 
adding this note, — " That is to say, it always brings unhappiness to the life of populations that are 
passing from the condition of Bedouin plunder to the state of agricultural and sedentary tribes." 



n6 job, xxxii. 19. 



The Lxx. has hee de gasteer mou hosper askos gleukous zeon [Codex A, gemon\ 
dedemenos ; hee hosper phuseeteer chalkeos errheegds [Codex A, chalkeds dedemenos 
kai katerrheegas\ "but my belly (is) glowing [Codex A, loaded] as a fastened-up 
skin-bottle of sweet wine; as the bellows of the brazier when it has burst [Codex 
A, as the bellows of the brazier when it has been fastened up has burst]." Sym- 
machus's version of the last clause is preserved — hds oinos neos adiapneustos, 'as 
new wine without ventilation.' The V. gives en venter mens quasi 7nustum absque 
spiraculo quod lagunculas novas disrumpit, 'behold, my belly is as new wine 
without a vent, which bursts asunder new vessels.' The T. has 'behold, my 
belly is as new wine \khamar khadath~\ which has not a vent, and it is burst [as] 
new vessels.' 



The Hebrew yayin, here used for grape-juice while passing into fermentation, is 
explained by the Lxx. as gleukos, by Symmachus as oinos neos, by the Targum as 
khamar khadath, and by the V. as mustum. The passage illustrates the explosive 
power of this juice when set fermenting.* This potency is due to the carbonic 
acid gas generated by the act of fermentation, which will burst the strongest vessels 
(whether skin, or wood iron-bound) in which it happens to be foolishly confined. 
The analogy drawn is between agitation of mind and the fermentation of yayin ; 
unless ' a vent ' is allowed, the safety of the body in the one case and of the bottle 
in the other is endangered. ' He was bursting to speak,' is a phrase not un- 
common to our vernacular. This text is often most erroneously compared with 
Matt. ix. 17. Elihu refers to wine that had been put, after it had been partially 
fermented, into new bottles made air-tight, through carelessness or from ignorance 
of the state of the wine ; whereas Christ refers contrastively to wine put into new 
bottles before fermentation, in order to prevent the wine from fermenting and the 
bottle from being burst. The traditional interpretation makes the Saviour con- 
tradict Elihu by affirming that wine could ferment in new bottles, closed up, 
without endangering the bottles ! [See Note on Matt. ix. 17.] 

* There is no commendation expressed, but the contrary. It is an abnormal-state compared with 
an abnormal-process. 



THE BOOK OF PSALMS. 



Psalm IV. Verse 7. 
Thou hast put gladness in my heart, more than in the time that 
their corn and their wine increased. 



The Hebrew stands, nahthatah simkhah be-libi maath degahnam ve-tirosham 
rahbu, "thou has put gladness (or cheer) in my heart from [or, more than when] 
their corn and their vine-fruit abounded." The Lxx. has eddkas euphrosuneen eis 
teen kardian ; apo karpou sitou kai oinou kai elaiou auton epleethuntheesan, "thou 
hast put gladness into the heart; by the fruit of their corn and wine and oil they 
have been satisfied." So Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. The V., which 
in the Book of Psalms follows the old Italic version, reads, dedisti Iceiitiam in corde 
meo ; a fructu frumenti, vini, et olei sui multiplicati sunt, "thou has given glad- 
ness into my heart ; by the fruit of their corn, wine, and oil they have been multi- 
plied." The Lxx. and V. agree in adding 'oil' to the list of earthly blessings 
which cheer the heart of man, and in separating the verse into two distinct clauses, 
Origen puts a circle round ' oil ' in his Hexapla to indicate that it was not extant 
in the Hebrew MSS. of his day. The compound particle maath (min, ' from,' and 
ath, 'with') is somewhat ambiguous, but the fact that all the Greek versions and 
the Vulgate have 'by the fruit of,' makes it likely that their MSS. may have read 
ma-abbai (^fc$D) instead of ma-ath (H^D)' The words as written in the 
Hebrew characters bear, as will be seen, a close resemblance. In the Song of 
Solomon, vi. II, ^^}$$ is translated in the A. V. 'the fruit of,' though Gesenius 
suggests 'greenness of.' It is, however, conjectured (Migne's Cursus Patrologicz) 
that apo kairou, ' from the time of,' became changed by the transcribers in mistake 
into apo karpou, ' from the fruit of.' St Jerome has ' in the time their corn and their 
wine were multiplied. ' St Augustine has a tempore, ' from the time. ' The sense 
afforded by the A. V. is in harmony with the spirit of the context, which seeks to 
enforce the supreme excellency of the Divine favor. The increase of corn and vine- 
fruit is a subject of lawful congratulation with all men ; but while the ungodly derive 
their chief enjoyment from these fruits of the earth, mellowed and multiplied by 
the light of the sun, a richer treasure of felicity is the portion of the man, however 
poor, whose heart is the recipient of the light of God's countenance. 



Psalm X. Verses 9, 10. 
9 He lieth in wait secretly as a lion in his den : he lieth in wait to 
catch the poor : he doth catch the poor, when he draweth him into 



Il8 PSALMS, XVI. 4, 5. 



his net. 10 He croucheth, and humbleth himself, that the poor may- 
fall by his strong ones. 



Language could scarcely be conceived more graphically descriptive of the course 
pursued by those who carry on the traffic in intoxicating liquors, regardless of the 
miseries produced. They may be acquitted of any malicious intention to murder 
and rob ; but the knowledge of what is produced by their daily business, and the 
artifices (including venal testimonies and advertisements) employed to extend it by 
drawing the poor and thoughtless into its meshes, must leave them without excuse, 
according to any standard of moral responsibility that can be applied to human 
conduct. Very grievous is it that a sense of this responsibility should be deadened 
through the license granted by the law to deal ' in the strong ones ' ; and the Chris- 
tian patriot is bound to free himself from all complicity with such legislation, by 
means of earnest protests against it, and by no less earnest efforts to confer power 
upon the people to protect themselves against this system of wholesale destruction. 
All men who take upon themselves the Christian name should see that their daily 
practice and business will not bring them under Job's description — ' Those that 
rebel against the light ' (xxiv. 13). 



Psalm XVI. Verse 4. 

Their sorrows shall be multiplied that hasten after another god : 
their drink offerings of blood will I not offer, nor take up their names 
into my lips. 

Their drink offerings of blood will i not offer] Hebrew, bal assik 
niskaihem mid-dakm, 'I will not pour out their libations (outpourings) from 
blood. ' The Lxx. has mee sunagoga tas sunagdgas anion ex haimaton, 1 1 will 
by no means assemble their assemblies of blood {lit. bloods).' The V. gives pre- 
cisely the same sense, non congregabo conventicula eorum de sanguinibus. The 
Syriac is identical with the A. V. The T. represents God as the speaker — ' I will 
not receive with satisfaction their libations, nor their offering of blood.' 



One of the forms of that cruelty which filled ' the dark places of the earth ' con- 
sisted in pouring out the blood of human victims to the gods who were adored ; 
and such libations were sometimes converted into vows in times of personal or 
public exigency. Similar customs characterize modern paganism. Dupuis men- 
tions, in his 'Journey in Ashantee,' that he saw the king gather the blood of a 
human victim into a vessel, drink one half, and offer the other to his idol. 



Psalm XVI. Verse 5. 

The Lord is the portion of mine inheritance and of my cup : thou 
maintainest my lot. 



And of my cup] Hebrew, ve-kosi, ' and my cup.' [See Note on Gen. xl. n.] 



PSALMS, LVIII. 4. 119 



Psalm XXIII. Verse 5. 
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies : 
thou anointest my head with oil ; my cup runneth over. 



My CUP runneth over] Hebrew, kosi revahyah, 'my cup has fulness-of- 
drink. ' Revahyah is from rahvah. [ See Note below on Psa. xxxvi. 8. ] The Lxx. 
has to poteerion sou methuskon hos kratiston, ' thy cup satisfies as the best (wine).' 
Methusko cannot here mean ' to intoxicate.' The V. reads, et calix meus inebrians 
quam prceclarus est, 'and my inebriating cup, how excellent it is'! St Jerome 
gives et calix meus inebrians. Sed et benignitas, 'and my cup (is) inebriating. 
But also kindness. ' Here the first two words of ver. 6 — ak tov, ' truly good,' — in 
A. V. ' surely goodness ' — are joined to ver. 5. This likewise seems to have 
been Origen's arrangement of the Hebrew. Symmachus has 'and thy good cup 
fills me full with everything,' — methuskon me diolou. Aquila and Theodotion have 
' my cup fills (me) full,' poteerion mou methuskon. 



Psalm XXXVI. Verse 8. 
They shall be abundantly satisfied with the fatness of thy house; 
and thou shalt make them drink of the river of thy pleasures. 



They shall be abundantly satisfied] Hebrew, yirveyun, ' they shall be 
satiated.' The margin of A. V. has 'watered.' Rah-vah, 'to drink largely, to be 
satisfied with drink,' corresponds with sah-va, as applied to food. Here it is used 
of fatness, 'which is drunk and sucked in, rather than eaten' (Gesenius). The 
Chaldee uses the cognate word to describe any kind of repletion from wine = to the 
Hebrew shakar. The Lxx. has methustheesontai apo pioteetos tou oikou sou, ' they 
shall be satiated with the fatness of thy house.' Here methuo is clearly used, not 
in the sense of 'to intoxicate,' but ' to fully satisfy. 



Psalm XLVI. Verse 3, 
Though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the moun- 
tains shake with the swelling thereof. Selah. 



Be troubled] Hebrew, yekhmeru, 'foam' — from khamar, 'to foam' or 
1 boil up ' ; hence khemer designates the juice of the grape, either when foaming 
under the treader's feet (Deut. xxxii. 14), or when bubbling up in a state of 
fermentation (Psa. lxxv. 8). The same word, we may observe, is applied to the 
foam of the sea, and to boiling bitumen, etc., and has no exclusive connection with 
the foam of the fermenting- vat, as Dr Laurie and others absurdly argue. 



Psalm LVIII. Verse 4. 
Their poison is like the poison of a serpent : they are like the deaf 
adder that stoppeth her ear.* 

* Wine is also compared in like manner, Prov. xxiii. 32. See Prel. Diss. 



120 PSALMS, LXV. IO. 



Their poison is like the poison of a serpent] Hebrew, khamath lahmo 
kidmuth khamath nahkash, 'the poison (that is) to them (is) after the likeness 
of the poison of a serpent.' The Lxx. reads, thumos autois kata teen homoiosin 
tou opheos, ' their rage (= venom) is after the likeness of (the poison of ) the serpent. ' 
The V. has furor Mis secundum similitudinem serpentis, ' their fury is according 
to the likeness of (the fury of ) a serpent.' [See Notes on Deut. xxxii. 33, Psa. 
cxl. 3, and Hos. vii. 5.] 



Psalm LX. Verse 3. 

Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: thou hast made us to 
drink the wine of astonishment. 



Thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment] Hebrew, 
hishqithahnu yayin taralah, 'thou hast made us drink the wine of reeling,' or 
trembling = that causes reeling or trembling. Taralah is from rahal, 'to reel 
or tremble.' The Lxx. has epotisas heemas oinon katanuxeos, 'thou hast made us 
drink wine of astonishment. ' Aquila has oinon karoseos, 'wine of stupefaction '; 
Symmachus, oinon salou, 'wine of agitation.' The V. reads, potasti nos vinocom- 
punctionis, ' thou hast made us drink from the wine of suffering ' ; St Jerome, 
vino consopiente, 'from stupefying wine.' The Ethiopic has 'wine of stupor.' 
The Syriac has 'feculent wine'; the Arabic, 'turbid wine.' The T. gives 'the 
wine of malediction.' 



By a striking metaphor the ' trembling ' caused by intoxicating yayin is viewed as 
a property of the wine itself; and when the Almighty is described as administering 
such wine, we are referred to the terrible visitations which He brings upon men, or 
suffers to befall them. [For similar figurative language see Notes on Psa. lxxv. 8; 
Isa. li. 17, 22; Jer. xxv. 15; xlix. 12; li. 7; Lam. iv. 21 ; Ezek. xxiii. 31 — 34; 
Hab. ii. 16; Zech. xii. 2; Rev. xvii. 24.] On this text Calvin observes of rahal, 
"They were drunk with the wine of drowsiness or giddiness. Not even the 
Hebrew interpreters agree about the word. For many translate it venom or 
poison. But it is easy to gather that the prophet speaks specially of a poisoned 
potion that bereaves men's minds of sense and understanding; for his purpose was 
to set before their eyes the curse of God that had reigned." 



Psalm LXV. Verse 10. 
Thou waterest the ridges thereof abundantly : thou settlest the 
furrows thereof: thou makest it soft with showers : thou blessest the 
springing thereof. 

Thou waterest the ridges thereof abundantly] Hebrew, telamiyah 
rawa, 'its furrows thou givest to drink deeply, ' = plentifully dost irrigate. 
Ravva is in the Piel conjugation, from rahvah. The Lxx. reads, tous aulakas 
autees methuson, ' saturate her furrows ' ; the V., rivos ejus inebria ' to fill up her 
channels. ' 



PSALMS, LXXI. 4. 121 



Psalm LXVI. Verse 12. 
Thou hast caused men to ride over our heads; we went through 
fire and through water: but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy 
place. 



Into a wealthy place] Hebrew, larvahiah (from rahvah), ' to a well-watered 
place ' = to a place of great plenty. The Lxx. has eis anupsucheen, ' into [a place 
of ] refreshment ' ; the V., in refrigerium, ' to a cool place ' = a place of consolation. 



Psalm LXIX. Verse 12. 
They that sit in the gate speak against me ; and I was the song of 
the drunkards. 



I was the SONG OF THE drunkards] Hebrew, tc-neginoth shothai shakar, 
' and songs the drinkers of shakar '= songs are made about me by the drinkers of 
shakar. The Lxx. reads, kai eis erne epsallon oipinontes toic oinou, ' and they sang 
about me who were drinking wine ' ; Aquila, ' and the songs of those drinking 
strong drink' — methusma ; Symmachus, 'and those drinking strong drink 
{methusma) sang of me.' The V. has etin me psallebant qui bibebant vinum, 'and 
those who drank wine sang about me ' ; St Jerome, ' and those drinking wine 
were singing.' 

The Lxx. regards shakar here as equivalent to yayin. The T. paraphrases 
thus : — " And I shall be the song of those who go to drink strong drink {marvath) 
in the public-house {Vvaith qarqasvan)" — so that shakar is here rendered, not by 
khamar attiq, ' old wine,' as in every place except one, but by marvath, as in Lev. 
x. 8. See Note there. 



The Psalmist intimates that he was the subject of satirical and ribald songs by 
the votaries of shakar. It was no new thing, even in his day, for those who imbibed 
freely the spirit of wine, to revile those who were filled with the 'spirit divine.' 



Psalm LXIX. Verse 21. 
They gave me also gall for my meat ; and in my thirst they gave 
me vinegar to drink. 



They gave me also gall for my meat] Hebrew, vay-yitu ve-baruthi rosh, 
'and they gave (as) my food, gall.' The Lxx. reads choleen, 'gall.' So Symma- 
chus. The V. \v2sfel. Rosh did not designate poison in general, but some special 
bitter product. 

And in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink] Hebrew, ve-lizmai 
yashqicni khometz, ' and to me thirsting, they-gave-to-drink fermented liquor ' = 
vinegar, the result of the acetous fermentation. The Lxx. has oxos, ' vinegar ' ; 
the V., aceto, 'with vinegar.' 



Psalm LXXI. Verse 4. 
Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked : out of the 
hand of the unrighteous and cruel man. 
16 



122 PSALMS, LXXV. 8. 



And cruel man] Hebrew, ve-khomatz, ' and soured (one) '= the man whose 
disposition resembles vinegar. The Lxx. has adikountos, 'of the unjust one.' So 
the V., iniqui. It may, however, carry the sense of 'corrupt,' as the idea of 
ferment did with Paul (i Cor. v. 6—8). So Greenfield. 



Psalm LXXIII. Verse 21. 
Thus my heart was grieved, and I was pricked in my reins. 



Thus my heart was grieved] Hebrew, ki yithkhahmmatz le-vahvi, ' for 
fermented was my heart,' i. e. it lost its sweetness, as if under the action of a 
ferment, and became embittered = the phrase of Isaiah, 'The sweet-drink shall 
become bitter. ' 

The Lxx. has strangely eeuphranthee, 'has rejoiced'; but the Aldine and Com- 
plut. editions read exekauthee, ' inflamed ' ; Symmachus, sunestelleto, ' was drawn 
together ' ; the V., quia inflammatum est cor meum, 'wherefore my heart was in- 
flamed.' St Jerome has contractum, ' drawn together.' 



Psalm LXXV. Verse 8. 
For in the hand of the Lord there is a cup, and the wine is red ; it 
is full of mixture; and he poureth out of the same: but the dregs 
thereof, all the wicked of the earth shall wring them out, and drink 
them. 



A cup] Hebrew, kos, ' a vessel ' = a goblet. The T. has ' a cup of malediction. ' 

And the wine is red] Hebrew, veyayin kkamar, 'and the wine foams,' from 
the presence of some fermenting agent and potent drugs. The Lxx. reads, oinou 
akratou, 'of wine unmixed.' Symmachus has kai oinos akratos, 'and the wine 
is unmixed ' ; St Jerome, vino meraco, the V. vini meri, ' of neat wine ' ; and the 
T., khamar as hin, 'strong wine.' The fermented wine which was drunk undi- 
luted with water was called by the Greeks akratos, by the Romans merum, and to 
drink such wine was deemed the act of drunkards only. What would those pagans 
have said of Christians who drink brandied wines — unmixed wine mingled with 
fiery spirit ? 

It is full of mixture] Hebrew, mala mesek, 'full of mixture.' Mesek comes 
from mahsak, to mix or mingle. The noun occurs in this place only ; the verb is 
applied to a pleasant compound in Prov. ix. 2, 5, and to an injurious preparation 
in Isa. v. 22. The analogous verb mezeg is used in Cant. vii. 3. The Lxx. 
reads pleeres kerasmatos, and the V. plenus misto, ' full of mixture ' ; Symmachus 
has pleeron ekchutheis, 'full, poured out.' The wine is unmixed, yet full of 
mixture; unmixed in the sense of undiluted, full of mixture because combined with 
drugs. The characteristic of nearly all the various forms of intoxicating liquor 
now retailed, is that they are both diluted and adulterated, with the sole object 
of increasing the profits of the vender, whatever may happen to the buyer and 
consumer. Large quantities of potent drugs, for which there is no other human 
use, are annually imported into Britain and America. 

And he poureth out of the same] Hebrew, vay-yaggar mizzek, 'and he 
poureth out from this.' The Lxx. reads, kai eklinen ek toutou eis touto, 'and 
he turns (it) from this to this '= turns it from side to side, that the mingling may 



PSALMS, LXXVIII. 47, 65. 123 

be more complete. Symmachus has oste elkein ap'autou, 'so as to take from it' ; 
the V., et inclinavit ex hoc in hoc, ' and he has inclined (it) from this to this ' ; St 
Jerome, et propinabit exeo, 'and he will give to drink from it.' The Hebrew- 
implies that the mixed wine is poured out into the cups, giving a portion to each 
godless people and person. 

But the dregs thereof] Hebrew, ak shemariha, 'surely the dregs of it.' 
Ak, abbreviated from akan, is clearly not used here as an adverb of limitation, but 
of confirmation, as twice in Psa. lviii. 12, where it is rendered in A. V. 'verily,' 
— "Verily there is a reward of the righteous ; verily there is a God that judgeth in 
the earth." Shemariha, 'its dregs,' here signifies the thicker (hence sedimentary) 
part of the mixture, which had not been perfectly combined with the rest. Not 
only was the fluid portion of the mesek to be poured out for the profane to drink, 
but the still more stupefying part of it reserved at the bottom of the cup should be 
served out to them. The Lxx. reads, pleen hotrugias autou, ' even the dregs of it ' ; 
the V., verumtamen fcex ejus, 'even thus its feculence.' 

All the wicked of the earth shall wring them out, and drink 
them] Hebrew, yimtzu yishtu kol rishai aretz, ' all the wicked of the earth shall 
suck out (yimtzzi) drink up (yishtu).' The Lxx. has ouk exekenothee piontai 
pantees oi hamartoloi tees gees, ' have not been wholly poured out ; all the sinners of 
the earth shall drink (them).' So also the V., non est exinanita, bibent omnes 
peccatores terra, 'is not emptied out; all sinners of the earth shall drink (it).' St 
Jerome has ' nevertheless, all the impious of the earth, drinking, will drain up its 
dregs.' 



The retributive vengeance of the Supreme Judge is depicted under the image of 
a cup which He holds in His hand, the wine whereof foams with the fermenting 
mixtures with which it is filled ; from this cup He pours out to all the guilty their 
just proportion, and assuredly the wicked of the earth shall receive it, till the last 
contents of the cup have been drained and sucked up. This terrible and impressive 
representation is surely calculated to inspire not only a fear of all sin, but of 
all fermenting and inflaming mixtures which so vividly symbolize the consequences 
of unpardoned guilt. 

Psalm LXXVIII. Verse 47. 
He destroyed their vines with hail, and their sycamore trees with 
frost. 



He destroyed their vines with hail] Hebrew, yakarog bab-barad 
mam, 'he killed with hail their vines,' i. e. not every identical tree, but trees 
throughout the land. 

I This statement is evidence, not only that vines existed in Egypt in the time of 
Moses, but that the plague of hail extended 'throughout all the land of Egypt' 
(Exod. ix. 25) as far as the vineyard districts. If gaphnam be taken in its general 
sense of 'their trees with twigs,' the Psalmist's words coincide with those of the 
historian, that the storm of hail 'brake every tree of the field.' 



Psalm LXXVIII. Verse 65. 
Then the Lord awaked as one out of sleep, and like a mighty man 
that shouteth by reason of wine. 



124 PSALMS, LXXX. 8 — 1 6. 

Like a mighty man that shouteth by reason of wine] Hebrew, ke- 
gibor methronan miy-yayin, ' as a mighty one recovering himself from wine.' The 
Lxx. and Aquila have hos dunatos kekraipaleekos ex oinou, ' as a mighty man 
who has been debauched (or overcome) by wine.' Symmachus gives hos dunatos 
dialulon ex oinou, ' as a mighty man speaking out from wine. ' The V. has tanquam 
potens crapulatus a vino, 'as a mighty (one) surfeited by wine.' The A. V. 
derives methronan from rahnan, ' to utter a tremulous sound ' = ' to shout ' or 
'to wail.' Gesenius, who derives it from run, 'to conquer, to overcome,' agrees 
with the Lxx. and V. The Syriac gives 'as a man whom his wine sends forth.' 
But since methronan is in the Hithpael conjugation, frequently used as reflective of 
Piel, and, similarly to the Middle Voice in Greek, to describe the action of a person 
upon himself, the passage may be translated, ' like a mighty one ( = hero) over- 
coming (or delivering) himself from wine. ' The Ethiopic reads, ' as a mighty one 
who has cast aside wine.' The T. is emphatic, — d'mitk'peqath min khamar, .' as a 
man having recovered himself from wine.' The allusion to 'sleep' in the first 
clause is strongly confirmatory of this reading. 



By a bold and powerful figure, the God of Israel is conceived as having been 
insensible to the murderous triumph of His foes. Like a hero who has fallen 
asleep from the effects of wine — sunk into the profoundest of all slumber, — but who, 
having awoke, shakes himself free from the influences of his wine, and is ready to 
reassert his natural prowess ; so He, the Almighty, casting aside His apparent 
indifference, has smitten, his enemies with resistless majesty. The A. V. brings 
God before us as acting like a hero when under the maddening power of wine; but 
the interpretation now proposed restricts the likeness to the period when the hero, 
becoming disengaged from his vinous thraldom, goes forth 'conquering, and to 
conquer.' 



Psalm LXXX. Verses 8— i6. 
8 Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt : thou hast cast out the 
heathen, and planted it. 9 Thou preparedst room before it, and 
didst cause it to take deep root, and it filled the land. io The hills 
were covered with the shadow of it, and the boughs thereof were like 
the goodly cedars, u She sent out her boughs unto the sea, and 
her branches unto the river. 12 Why hast thou then broken down 
her hedges, so that all they which pass by the way do pluck her ? 
13 The boar out of the wood doth waste it, and the wild beast of 
the field doth devour it. 14 Return, we beseech thee, O God of 
hosts : look down from heaven, and behold, and visit this vine ; 
15 And the vineyard which thy right hand hath planted, and the 
branch that thou madest strong for thyself. 16 // is burned with fire, 
it is cut down : they perish at the rebuke of thy countenance. 



V. 8. Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt] Hebrew, gephen mim- 
Mitzraim tassiah, 'a vine out of Mizraim (Egypt) thou broughtest.' 

This sustained personification of Israel as a vine has been greatly admired on ac- 
count of its elegance and poetical beauty. Doubtless, the image of a vine was chosen 
by the Psalmist chiefly on account of its appropriateness to the ideas he desired to 
express ; but the felicitousness of the figure is enhanced from the evidence supplied 
by scriptural references and monumental pictures, showing that the vine was very 



PSALMS, CIV. 14, 15. 125 

elaborately and scientifically cultivated in Egypt. To affirm that 'it filled the 
land ' (ver. 9), and that ' the hills were covered with the shadow of it' (ver. 10), 
was an allusion to the ancient custom of planting the vine on hill-sides, and 
carrying it by festoons, stretching from tree to tree, almost to incredible distances. 
In the language of Greek poetry, " the vine was 'the mistress of trees,' because 
supporting herself on them as on the shoulders of domestics." 

V. 11. Her boughs — her branches] Hebrew, qetziriha — yonqothiha, 'her 
boughs — her suckers.' 

V. 14. This vine] Hebrew, gephen zoth, 'this vine.' 
V. 15. And the vineyard] Hebrew, ve-kannah, 'and the plant.' 
And the branch] Hebrew, ve-al-ban, 'and upon the son,' poetically used for 
'offshoot.' The Lxx. has 'upon the son of man.' 



Psalm XCIV. Verse 20. 

Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which 
frameth mischief by a law ? 



Albert Barnes, in his discourse on this text, observes : "A 'throne of iniquity' 
is a government founded on iniquity, or that sustains iniquity: such a throne 
frames mischief by a law, when it protects and patronizes that which is evil, or 
when those who practice evil may plead that what they do is legal, and may take 
refuge under the laws of the land. Such a government can have no fellowship 
with God. His throne is a throne of righteousness : he makes no law to protect 
or regulate evil. His laws, in relation to all that is wrong, only prohibit and 
condemn.'''' If the licensed liquor-traffic be judged by its fearful fruits, the laws 
which create and sanction it are palpably condemned by this passage. No Christian 
or Jewish citizen should have part in voting into being, laws which are the most 
prolific fountain of mischief, sin, and misrule, that the world has ever known. 



Psalm CIV. Verses 14, 15. 

14 He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the 
service of man: that he may bring forth food out of the earth; 
is And wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to make his 
face to shine, and bread which strengtheneth man's heart. 



A more literal translation of the fourteenth verse would be, "Causing grass to 
grow for the cattle, and grain for the cultivation of man, (so as) to bring forth 
bread ( =food) from the earth." 

V. 15. And wine that maketh glad the heart of man] Hebrew, 
ve-yayin ye-sammakh le-vav enosh, ' even wine (that) cheers the heart of man. ' 
The Lxx. reads, kai oinos euphrainei kardian anthropou, ' and wine delights the 
heart of man ' ; the V.', et vimim Icetificet cor hominis, ' and wine may cheer the 
heart of man.' St Jerome has Icetificat, ' cheers.' 

And oil to make his face to shine] The Hebrew is lehatzhil penim min- 
shemen, 'to cause the face to shine from oil.' A question arises here, — Does the 
Psalmist (as construed in the A. V. ) refer to oil as the agent making the face to 
shine? The arguments in favor of an affirmative are derived from (1) the 
probability that in enumerating the produce of the earth, a reference would be made 



126 PSALMS, CV. 33. 



to shemen (oil) as well as to lekhem (bread) and yayin ; (2) the authority of the 
Lxx., which reads 'delights the heart of man', tou hilarunai prosbpon en elaid, 
* making the face to be cheerful with oil ' ; also the V., ut exhilaret faciem in oleo, 
1 that he may brighten his face with oil. ' On behalf of the negative it may be 
urged (1) that the construction would have been different had the Psalmist wished 
to refer to oil as the agent, for he would have written, ' and oil makes the face to 
shine ' ; (2) that the grammatical concord of the original does not admit of the 
rendering given by the Lxx., the V., and the A. V. On this point even the 
non-Hebrew scholar can form an intelligent judgment. "And wine to make 
cheerful the heart of man, and to brighten (his) face from oil," is an arrangement 
of words quite inconsistent with the opinion that it is the oil which brightens the 
face. But a very excellent sense is certainly afforded by taking the particle min 
(rendered ' from ') to signify ' more than ' : "And wine to make cheerful the heart 
of man, and to brighten his face more than oil (does)." (3) The Eastern versions 
resemble the Hebrew too closely in the peculiarity of their propositions to make 
them conclusive witnesses in a case of this kind ; though the Syriac sustains the 
rendering suggested. On the whole the weight of translation is with the A. V., 
but the weight of internal evidence with the proposed rendering. 

And bread which strengtheneth man's heart] Hebrew, ve-lekhem 
le-vav enosh yisad, 'and bread (food) to the heart of man gives support.' The 
Lxx. reads, kai artos kardian anthrbpou steerizei, ' and bread makes firm the heart 
of man'; the V., et panis cor hominis confrmet, 'and bread may strengthen the 
heart of man.' 



The Psalmist in this Song of Thanksgiving passes in review the provision 
made by the bountiful Creator for the wants of His creatures ; and in the course of 
this review he refers to the grass springing up for the cattle, and to all the grain- 
bearing plants which offer themselves to the culture of man (and through that 
culture) for his daily food. From the same source also comes 'wine,' that juice -of 
the grape which cheers the heart and makes the face to shine more than when 
anointed with oil; and as this delights by its pleasantness, so food builds up the 
body and enables man to labor for himself and others. Yayin may here stand 
for tiros A (vine-fruit), to which a similar quality is ascribed (Judg. ix. 13, and 
Psa. iv. 7), being, with corn, the chief of foods : but if it be held that a designed 
contrast is presented between food as solid sustenance and wine as drink, it by no 
means follows that the Psalmist referred to a power of giving pleasure by alcoholic 
narcotism of the nerves. The ideas really contrasted are sustenance and sweetness ; 
for it is well known that the love of sweet drinks is a passion among Orientals. 
One thing is certain, — that the wine which is drunk as God has formed it in nature 
must be the kind on which this blessing rests ; and if men find more delight in 
wine or other fluids that have acquired an intoxicating character, they cannot 
plead for their use either a Divine creation or commendation. The Psalmist, 
beyond all controversy, regarded the wine to which he alluded as a creature of 
God, the natural, uncorrupted product of his power, and to such wine the eulogy 
pronounced upon it in this verse must be absolutely restricted. [See Note on 
Gen. i. 29.] 



Psalm CV. Verse 33. 

He smote their vines also and their fig trees ; and brake the trees 
of their coasts. 



PSALMS, CX. 7. 127 



He smote their vines also] Hebrew, vay-yak gaphnam, 'and he struck 
their vines.' 



Psalm CVII. Verse 27. 
They reel to and fro, and stagger like a drunken man, and are at 
their wit's end. 



They reel to and FRO] Hebrew, yakhogu, 'they are giddy.' Khagag signi- 
fies 'to move in a circle,' hence to feel giddy or confused. Every one knows the 
children's custom of running round — reeling — and the giddiness resulting. The 
Lxx. has etarachtheesan, 'they were dismayed' ; the V., turbati sunt, ' they were 
confounded.' The Syriac and Targum give the idea of trembling. 

And stagger] Hebrew, ve-yanuhu, 'and move to and fro.' The Lxx. has 
esaleutheesan, ' they stagger ' ; the V., moti sunt, ' they moved about.' 

Like a drunken man] Hebrew, kash-shikkor, 'as a deep drinker.' The Lxx. 
reads, hos ho methuon, 'as he who drinks deeply'; the V., sicut ebrius, 'as one 
drunk.' So the other versions. The T. has 'the deep drinker of wine' (ravyah 
dakhamar). 

And are at their wit's end] Hebrew, ve-kahl khakmatham titkbalah, 'and 
all their wisdom (or intelligence) is swallowed up.' The Lxx. has kai pasa hee 
sophia auton katepothee, 'and all their wisdom is drunk down.'* The V. reads, 
et omnis sapientia eorum devorata est, 'and all their wisdom was devoured.' The 
metaphor contained in tethbalah, ' s wallowed-up, ' is an obvious extension of the 
comparison between the state to which drinkers of intoxicating shakar as well as 
imperilled mariners are reduced. Not only does such drink make those who 
indulge in it giddy and roll about, but it swallows up the wisdom of the user. 
Can it be a mark of wisdom to imbibe any quantity of an article so voracious and 
dangerous ? (Solomon takes up the same figure, Prov. xxiii. 33.) 



Psalm CVII. Verse 37. 
And sow the fields, and plant vineyards, which may yield fruits of 
increase. 



And plant vineyards] Helfrew, vay-yithu kerahmim, 'and plant vineyards.' 
So the Lxx. and V. read, 'have planted vineyards.' 



Psalm CX. Verse 7. 
He shall drink of the brook in the way : therefore shall he lift up 
the head. 

He shall drink of the brook in the way] Hebrew, nun-nakhal bad-derek 
yishteh, ' from the brook in the way he shall drink.' 



This being a Messianic psalm, the allusion to ' drinking of the brook ' is alle- 
gorical ; though it is no doubt true that the Saviour often refreshed Himself in His 
journeys of mercy by drinking of the wayside stream not yet dried up by the 
summer's heat. Some commentators conceive that the 'waters of affliction' 

* Compare this phrase and idea with the same in 1 Pet. v. 8. 



128 PSALMS, CXL. 3. 



are here referred to, but the concluding clause, 'therefore shall he lift up the 
head,' seems to point to the refreshing result of the draught received. The image 
is drawn from the act of a pursuing leader, who, exhausted and with drooping 
head, drinks of a neighboring brook, and by drinking 'lifts up his head,' i. e, 
feels as if he had acquired new energy and life. In Eastern lands the full meaning 
of living waters is well understood. 



" Traverse the desert and then you can tell 
What treasures exist in the cold, deep well ; 
Sink in despair on the red, parched earth, 
And then you can reckon what water's worth.". 



Psalm CXXVIII. Verse 3. 
Thy wife shall be as a fruitful vine by the sides of thine house : thy 
children like olive plants round about thy table. 



A fruitful VINE] Hebrew, ke-gephen poriah, ' and a vine bearing- fruit ' ; 
the*Lxx. hos ampelos eutheenousa, 'as a fruitful vine.' So the V., sicut vitis 
abundans. 



Psalm CXL. Verse 3. 
They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent : adders' poison 
is under their lips. Selah. 



They have sharpened their tongues like a serpent] Hebrew, shannu 
le-shonam kemo nakhash, ' they have sharpened ( = made ready for striking) their 
tongues like as a serpent.' Some think the metaphor is drawn from resemblance 
of motion between a serpent darting out his tongue and the action of a person 
sharpening an instrument. 

Adders' poison is under their lips] Hebrew, khamath ak-shav takhath 
sephathaimo, 'the heat ( = inflammatory poison) of an asp is under their lips.' 
The Lxx. translates khamath by ios, * dart '= poison ; the V. by venenum, ' venom,' 
poison. [See Note on Psa. lviii. 4.] 



Obs. This is the word thrice applied to wine in the Bible, while in Prov. xxiii. 
32, the above comparison — stinging like a serpent's fang — is also employed. Can 
such language be rationally understood of a good thing ? 



THE BOOK OF PROVERBS. 



Chapter III. Verses 9, 10. 
9 Honor the Lord with thy substance, and with the firstfruits of 
all thine increase : 10 So shall thy barns be filled with plenty, and 
thy presses shall burst out with new wine. 



V. 10. And thy presses shall burst out with new wine] Hebrew, vl- 
tirosh yeqavikah yiphrotzu, 'and (as to) vine-fruit thy wine-presses shall break 
down.' The Lxx. has oinb de at leenoi sou ekbhtzosin, ' and (so that) with wine 
thy presses may burst forth ' ; one MS. has huper ekbluzdsin, ' overflow ' ; the V., 
etvino torcularia tua redundabunt, 'and with wine thy presses shall abound.' This 
is one of the rare passages which (in the versions) can be cited as lending some 
apparent countenance to the common notion of tirosh as the liquid (and not the 
solid) fruit of the vine. The English translators as usual give ' new wine ' as the 
meaning of the word, which would make it correspond to the Greek gleukos and the 
Latin mustum ; but even supposing that yiphrotzu is rightly rendered by ' shall 
burst out with,' it is clear that a liquid sense is not thereby assigned to tirosh. A 
bag may figuratively be said to ' burst out with ' money, and a warehouse with dry 
goods. When, however, we examine the verb phahratz we see that it gives no 
support to the notion of tirosh as a fluid. The radical signification of phahratz is 
to 'break' or 'breakdown,' and this sense well agrees with the context, "Thy 
barns shall be filled with plenty, and thy wine-presses shall break down with vine- 
fruit." If the secondary sense of 'increase' be preferred, there will be the same 
compatibility of the phrase with tirosh as a solid : ' And with tirosh thy wine-presses 
shall increase (or abound).' This rendering is selected by the V. and Syriac. 
Gesenius justly objects to the translation 'shall burst with,' on the ground that 
"neither can the vat of a wine-press, nor yet the wine-press itself, burst with 
plenty of new wine; that, a cask or wine-skin alone can." He therefore suggests 
'overflow with,' phraseology quite consistent with the solid nature of tirosh, since 
nothing is more common than the use of such figures of speech as ' an overflowing 
assembly,' 'the streets overflowed with people,' etc. The connection of tirosh 
with the wine-press has no doubt favored its conception as a liquid, but this 
error arises from inattention. The writer is not speaking of what is done in the 
wine-press, but of the fruit collected in it, just as in the first clause of the verse he 
does not refer to threshing the corn, but to its being stored in the barn. The whole 
passage may be thus expounded : — ' Let the Lord be honored with thy sub- 
stance by a dedication to Him of the firstfruits of thy increase, and in return He 
17 



130 PROVERBS, VI. 27, 28. 

will so reward thy industry that thy barns shall be crammed with the produce of 
thy fields, and thy wine-presses shall teem (as if ready to break down) with the 
produce of thy vines.' 



Chapter IV. Verse 17. 
For they eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of 
violence. 



And drink the wine of violence] Hebrew, ve-yayn khamahsim yishtu, 
'and the wine of violences they drink.' The Lxx. has oino de paronomo 
methuskontai, ' and with lawless wine they are drunken.' Aquila and Symmachus 
have 'they drink the wine of unjust persons ' {oinon adikiori). The V. reads, et 
vinum iniquitatis bibunt, 'and the wine of iniquity they drink.' 



As ' the bread of wickedness ' signifies the bread obtained by wicked conduct, 
so this ' wine of violence ' is the wine violently stolen, or purchased by money 
wrested from its lawful possessors. 



Chapter V. Verse 15. 
Drink waters out of thine own cistern, and running waters out of 
thine own well. 



Thine own cistern] Hebrew, niib-borekah, 'from thy pit (or cistern).' 
And running waters out of thine own well] Hebrew, ve-nozlim mittok 
bedrekak, 'and streams from the midst of thy well.' 



Pure domestic pleasures are beautifully and attractively described in this verse. 
The sensualist may seek forbidden waters and inflaming drinks, strange and illicit 
loves, but the man who desires the truest satisfactions will find them under his own 
roof, with the wife of his choice, whose affection and attentions are to be not only 
like waters of a cistern, but like waters flowing up, ever fresh, from a perennial 
spring. 



Chapter V. Verse 19. 
Let her be as the loving hind and pleasant roe; let her breasts 
satisfy thee at all times ; and be thou ravished always with her love. 



Satisfy thee] Hebrew, yeravvukah, 'will satiate thee' — from ravak, 'to 
drink to the full,' and several times in A. V. 'to be drunk.' The cognate Chaldee 
term is used in the Targums as equivalent to shah-kar. Aquila has titthoi autees 
metkuskelosan se, ' her breasts may satisfy thee, ' not intoxicate. The V. has ubera 
ejus inebrient te, ' let her breasts inebriate thee. ' 



Chapter VI. Verses 27, 28. 
27 Can a man take fire in his bosom, and his clothes not be 
burned ? 28 Can one go upon hot coals, and his feet not be burned ? 



PROVERBS, IX. I, 2, 5. 131 

These proverbs are capable of a broader application than the one they receive 
from the Wise man. All objects adapted to excite evil in thought and action should 
be avoided so far as possible, and to tamper with them is a violation of moral pru- 
dence. Presumption slays its millions of souls, and in the almost insane self- 
confidence with which men consume intoxicating drinks, with the lamentable 
consequences everywhere and every day around them, we have a warning response 
to the inquiries of Solomon. With ' fire-waters ' that are ever burning, not the 
clothes only, but the very lives and hopes of multitudes, it must surely be best to 
have nothing to do. 



Chapter VII. Verse 18. 

Come, let us take our fill of love until the morning : let us solace 
ourselves with loves. 



Let us take our fill of love] Hebrew, nirveh dodim, * we shall be filled 
(satiated) with loves'; from ravah, 'to drink largely, or to repletion.' Aquila, 
Symmachus and Theodotion, all read methusthomen, ' let us be filled (or satiated)' ; 
the V., inebriemur, 'let us be inebriated.' 



Chapter IX. Verses i, 2, 5. 

1 Wisdom hath builded her house, she hath hewn out her seven 
pillars : 2 She hath killed her beasts ; she hath mingled her wine ; 
she hath also furnished her table. ... 5 Come, eat of my bread, 
and drink of the wine which I have mingled. 



V. 2. She hath mingled her wine] Hebrew, mahskah yaynah, 'she has 
mixed her wine.' The Lxx. gives ekerasen eis krateera ton heautees oinon, 'she 
has mixed her wine in a mixing-bowl' ; the V., miscuit vinum, 'she has mixed 
wine.' 

V. 5. And drink of the wine which I have mingled] Hebrew, ushthu be- 
yayin mahsahkti, ' drink from the wine (that) I have mixed.' The Lxx. reads, kqi 
piete oinon hon ekerasa humin, ' and drink wine that I have mixed for you ' ; the 
V., et bibite vinum quod miscui vobis, 'and drink ye the wine which I have mixed 
for you.' 



The mixed wine prepared by Wisdom for her friends must, it is clear, be 
regarded as essentially different from the mixed wine prepared by God for His 
enemies (Psa. lxxv. 8); hence, without caution and discrimination in dealing 
with the imagery of Scripture, violence will be done to every principle of 
common sense and just interpretation. This passage may be accepted as ade- 
quate proof that in the times of the writer the art of mixing wine with aromatic 
spices was known and frequently practised, the object being not to fire the blood 
with spirituous excitement, but to gratify the taste with delicate flavors that might 
'cheer yet not inebriate.' 



132 PROVERBS, XI, 25, 26. 

Chapter X. Verse 26. 
As vinegar to the teeth, and as smoke to the eyes, so is the slug- 
gard to them that send him. 



As vinegar TO the teeth] Hebrew, ka-khometz lash-shinnaim, ' as fermented 
drink to the teeth.' Vinegar, formed by the acetous fermentation, causes, when 
full and strong, pain to the teeth, and by softening the alkali of the enamel tends 
to unfit them for their masticating function ; hence it forms, with the action of 
smoke on the eyes, a suitable illustration of the sluggish messenger, whose delay 
vexes the sender, and hinders him in his duty. The Lxx. has hosper omphax 
odousi blaberon, 'as a sour grape is hurtful to the teeth ' ; the V., sicut acetum 
dentibus, ' as vinegar to the teeth. ' 



Chapter XI. Verse 25. 

The liberal soul shall be made fat : and he that watereth shall be 
watered also himself. 



And he that watereth shall be watered also himself] Hebrew, 
ti-marveh gam-htt yoreh, ' and he that gives to drink-freely (or waters), even he 
shall-be-supplied-freely-with-drink (or watered).' The force of ravak is here 
clearly brought out. Symmachus has ' he who is drenched (met/iusos) will also 
himself be drenched ' ; the V., et qui inebriat ipse quoque inebriabitur, ' and he who 
inebriates will also himself be inebriated (amply supplied).' The Lxx. reads, 'but 
a man who is wrathful is not becoming:.' 



Chapter XI. Verse 26. 

He that withholdeth corn, the people shall curse him : but bless- 
ing shall be upon the head of him that selleth it. 



In the light of this text what blessing can be imagined to rest upon the waste of 
fifty million bushels of grain every year in the United Kingdom to supply its 
inhabitants with intoxicating liquors ? This is the worst possible form of with- 
holding corn, for it is a direct and absolute loss to the community; it greatiy 
raises the market price of grain, and it results, not in a mere waste of the corn 
withheld, but in the production of beverages that fill the land with want and woe, 
vice and crime, disease and death. The simple truth is, that destruction by fire of 
the same quantity of grain would be a comparative blessing.* 

*The public journals of Great Britain occasionally render testimony to the truth of what is 
alleged above. The Times newspaper, in a leading article in the December of 1853, when refer- 
ring to a speech delivered by the King of Sweden, remarked, " It is a peculiarity of spirit- 
drinking, that money spent upon it is, at the best, thrown away, and in general far worse than 
thrown away. It neither supplies the natural wants of man nor offers an adequate substitute 
for them. Indeed, it is far too favorable a view of the subject to treat the money spent on it as 
if it were cast into the sea. A great portion of the harvest of Sweden and of many other coun- 
tries is applied to a purpose compared with which it would have been better that the corn had 
never grown, or that it had mildewed in the ear. No way so rapid to increase tlie 
•wealth of nations and the morality of society cotdd be devised, as the utter annihilation of the 
■manufacture of ardent spirits, constituting as tliey do an infinite waste and an unmixed evil. 
The man who shall invent a really efficient antidote to this system of voluntary and daily poisoning, 
will deserve a high place among the benefactors of his species." Such an antidote does not need 
1 inventing ' ; personally, it is found in abstinence ; socially, in forbidding men to traffic in and get 
gain from such a pernicious merchandise. 



PROVERBS, XX. I. 133 



Chapter XX. Verse i. 
Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is de- 
ceived thereby is not wise. 

Wine is a mocker] Hebrew, late hay -y ay in, * a mocker (is) the wine ' ; the 
Lxx., akolaston oinos, ' an incorrigible (= a profligate, intemperate) thing (is) wine.' 
One MS. reads, apaideusia oinos, ' an undisciplinable thing is wine ' ; Aquila and 
Theodotion, chleuastees oinos, 'a derider (is) wine' ; Symmachus, ioimos oinos, 'a 
pestilent thing (is) wine.' The V. has luxuriosa res vinum est, 'an immoderate 
(or wanton) thing is wine ' ; the T., 'a mocking thing is wine.' The Hebrew latz 
is the participle of luiz, 'to mock' or 'deride,' and is frequently applied (as in 
Prov. ix. 7, 8; xiii. 1 ; xiv. 6; xv. 12 ; xix. 25) to men who scorn or contemn 
that which is good. Here it denotes their character. As applied to the wine that 
intoxicates (it applies to no other) this word symbolizes the effect of such wine 
upon the drinker, either in inclining him to mock at serious things, or in the 
mockery it may (by a figure) be said to make of the good resolutions he forms be- 
fore partaking of it. 

Strong drink is RAGING] Hebrew, homeh shakar, 'raging (is) shakar.' The 
Lxx. gives kai hubristikon methee, 'and full of violence (is) strong drink.' The 
V. has et tumultuosa ebrietas, 'and turbulent (is) inebriety.' The T. reads, 'and 
sikrah fills to the full (or inebriates) ' — ravythah. The T. here alters the form of 
the Hebrew shakar without translating it as elsewhere by khamar attiq, 'old wine,' 
or mirvai, 'strong-drink.' It is also noticeable that the V. for the first time 
renders shakar by ebrietas. [On shakar see Prel. Dis.] Homeh, rendered 
'raging,' comes from hahmah, ' to hum ' ; hence to make loud sounds and noises, 
as of water, a riotous people, etc. The statement that 'strong drink is raging' 
teaches that it causes disturbance internally to those who drink it — this is, to the 
letter, physically true, — and, through them, externally to their families and society 
at large. Nor are vocal signs of this disturbing agency often absent. 

And whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise] Hebrew, ve-kahl shogeh 
bo lo yekhkam, ' and whosoever wanders (or goes astray) through it, is not wise.' 
The Lxx. has pas de aphron toioutois sumpleketai, ' and every fool is entangled 
with them.' Codex A introduces before these words the following :—pas de ho 
summenomenos ouk estai sophos, ' and every one who has become connected (with 
them) shall not be wise,' etc. Another MS. has- 'but every one seduced 
(lumeinomenos) by it will not be wise.' The V. has quicumque his delectatur 
non erit sapiens, 'whosoever with these is delighted shall not be wise.' The T. 
has 'he who wanders through them shall not be wise.' 



Obs. 1. No teaching could be more definite than that conveyed in this pas- 
sage on the inherent properties of intoxicating drinks. Wine 'mocks,' strong 
drink ' rages ' ; and as these terms include all fermented liquors, it will not be 
contended that ardent spirits are entitled to a milder description or to warmer 
praise. 

2. Possessed of such qualities, the effects arising from the common use of such 
drinks might be predicated with certainty. Even in a community entirely well 
educated, wise, and pious, causes of mischief so powerful would make themselves 
felt, if admitted and trusted; but circulating as they ever have among the masses of 
mankind, who are governed by appetite rather than by intelligence, their influence 
has been terribly (though not to the moralist unexpectedly) severe. 



134 PROVERBS, XXL 1 7. 

3. There is nothing to warrant the conjecture that the ordinary and habitual 
use of these articles can, under any circumstances, be attended with less danger 
and damage than heretofore. They sustain a fixed relation to the nervous system 
of man, and it would require a constant miracle to neutralize or avert the effects 
natural to that relation. 

4. The first principle of all moral philosophy can, therefore, prescribe no 
remedy for the evil effects except the exclusion of the evil agents. To retain the 
causes and endeavor to counteract their tendencies and consequences is a policy 
that could only be justified were they either indispensable or inexcludable ; but 
being neither one nor the other, voluntarily to add to all other labor the work of 
counteracting their effects, is to do violence to common sense as much as if one 
were to fill a sieve with water, and is at the same time to forego an immense amount 
of service for God and man that might be usefully performed. 

5. Modern teetotalism is nothing more than the formal expression, practical 
embodiment, and organized propagation of the truths contained in this portion of 
the Divine Word. Each true Christian should on this account rejoice in every 
token that the wisdom of the Book is becoming translated into the wisdom of the 
Life; nor, is it wonderful that this lesson of wisdom, whenever duly digested, 
should prepare the mind for recognizing that * a greater than Solomon is here,' 
and for becoming ' wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus ' our 
Lord. 



Chapter XXI. Verse 17. 

He that loveth pleasure shall be a poor man : he that loveth wine 
and oil shall not be rich. 



The Hebrew of this verse reads, ish makhsor ohav simkhah, ohav yayin va- 
shemen lo yaashir, ' a needy man, loving pleasure, loving wine and oil, shall not be 
rich. ' The Lxx. gives aneer endees agapa euphrosuneen philon oinon kai elaion 
eis plouton, 'a poor man loves pleasure, loving wine and oil in abundance.' But 
Aquila and Symmachus agree with the Hebrew text and A. V., ou plouteesei, 'he 
shall not be rich. ' The V. has qui diligit epnlas in egestate erit, qui amat vinum et 
pinguia non ditabihir, ' he who is fond of feasts shall be in poverty, he who loves 
wine and fat things shall not be rich.' 



Self-indulgence is the high road to self-punishment. Luxury is expensive, and 
to yield to it is to contract effeminate habits with penury as a servant. Articles of 
luxury, however intrinsically harmless, have to be sparingly introduced, or they 
will empty the purse while they enervate the faculties by which it must be re- 
plenished. The yayin and shetnen, in the eye of the writer, were probably the 
costly kinds for which large sums were paid; but it may be still more forcibly 
said of the intoxicating liquors of our day, that those who love them shall not 
become rich if they are poor, though such as love them when rich may become 
poor by taking pleasure in them. The injuries to health, character, and intellect 
which strong drink produces, not only aggravate the curse of poverty which 
attends the direct misappropriation of the financial resources, but rank among the 
most frequent causes of failure in procuring the means of comfort attainable by 
steady and intelligent industry. 



PROVERBS, XXIII. 20, 21, 29 — 35. 1 35 

Chapter XXIII. Verses 20, 21. 

20 Be not among winebibbers; among riotous eaters of flesh: 
21 For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty : and 
drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags. 



V. 20. Be not among winebibbers] Hebrew, al tehi be-sovai-yayin, * be not 
among topers ( = soakers) of wine.' The Lxx. reads, mee isthi oinopotees, 'be not 
a winebibber ' ; the V., noli esse in conviviis potatorum, 'desire thou not to be in 
the feasts of drinkers.' [As to sovai see Prel. Dis., and Note on Deut. xxi. 20.] 

Among riotous eaters OF flesh] Hebrew, be-zollai vahsar lahmo, 'among 
wasters of flesh to them ' ( = their flesh). The Lxx. reads, meede ekteinou sumbo- 
lais, kreon le agorasmois, 'neither continue long at feasts, at purchases of flesh.' 
Theodotion has 'with those who are given to feastings on flesh among them- 
selves ' ; the V., nee in commessationibus eorum qui earnes ad vescendum conferunt y 
'nor in the revellings of those who contribute flesh to eat.' Some conceive that 
the allusion is not to wasting the flesh of animals by excessive feasting, but to such 
a wasting of the prodigal's own flesh as revelling is apt to induce. 

V. 21. For the drunkard and the glutton] Hebrew, ki sova ve-zolal, 'for 
the toper and the waster ' ( = profligate). The Lxx. has pas gar methusos kai por- 
no&opos, 'for every drunkard and fornicator (or profligate one).' Aquila, Sym- 
machus, and Theodotion render zolal by sumbolokopos, 'one given to feasting.' 
The V. reads, quia vacantes potibus et dantes symbola, ' because those who devote 
themselves to drinkings and give feasts.' 

Shall come to poverty] Hebrew, yivvarash, 'shall be made poor.' The 
Lxx. reads, ptocheusi, 'shall be poor'; the V., consumentur, 'shall be con- 
sumed.' 



Chapter XXIII. Verses 29 — 35. 

29 Who hath woe ? who hath sorrow ? who hath contentions ? who 
hath babbling ? who hath wounds without cause ? who hath redness 
of eyes ? 30 They that tarry long at the wine ; they that go to seek 
mixed wine. 31 Look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when 
it giveth his color in the cup, when it moveth itself aright. 32 At 
the last it biteth like a serpent, and stingeth like an adder. 33 Thine 
eyes shall behold strange women, and thine heart shall utter perverse 
things. 34 Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth down in the midst of 
the sea, or as he that lieth upon the top of a mast. 35 They have 
stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not sick : they have beaten 
me, and I felt it not : when shall I awake ? I will seek it yet again. 



V. 29. Who hath woe? who hath sorrow?] Hebrew, le-mi oi le-?)ti evoi, 
'to whom (is) lamentation? to whom sorrow?' The Lxx. reads, tini ouai, 
tini thorubos, ' to whom (is) woe? to whom trouble ? ' The V. has cui vce? cujus 
patri vce ? ' to whom is woe ? to whose father is woe ? ' Some interpreters consider 
both oi and aboi to represent sounds of grief; so that the sense would be, 'Who 
are they that cry out, O me ! woe is me ? ' 



136 PROVERBS, XXIII. 29 — 35. 

Who hath contentions?] Hebrew, le-mi midvahnim, 'to whom (are) con- 
tentions (or strifes)?' The Lxx. reads, tini krisis, 'to whom (is) division?' the 
V., cui rixce, 'to whom (are) contentions ? ' 

Who hath babbling?] Hebrew, le-mi siakh, 'to whom (is) brawling? ' The 
Lxx. reads, tini de aeediai kai leschai, ' to whom (are) disgusts and disputes ? ' the 
V., cuifovece, ' to whom (are) pitfalls ? ' 

Siakh may here be considered as the confused noise accompanying the midvahnim 
— drunken quarrels or contentions. 

Who hath wounds without cause?] Hebrew, le-mi petzahim khinnahm, 
* to whom are wounds for nothing ? ' = needless wounds — wounds without any 
reasonable ground, and without any useful result. The Lxx. reads, tini suntrimmata 
diakenees, 'to whom (are) bruises without a cause ? ' the V., cui sine causa vul- 
nera ? ' to whom are wounds without cause ? ' 

Who hath redness of eyes ?] Hebrew, le-mi khakliluth ainaim, ' to whom is 
lividness of eyes ? ' the Lxx., tinos pelidnoi oi ophthalmoi, ' whose eyes (are) livid? ' 
Aquila has katharoi, ' clear ' (unless this is an error of transcription for katakoroi, 
used in Gen. xlix. 12 : see Note); Symmachus, charopoi, 'bright' (or gleaming). 
The V. reads, cui suffusio oculorum, ' to whom is suffusion of eyes ? ' = bloodshot 
eyes. [As to khakliluth, see Note on Gen. xlix. 12. Jacob uses khaklili to 
describe the external marks of the grape-juice staining the, faces of the treaders; 
Solomon employs it to describe the livid circles round about the eyes of the 
tippler. ] 

V. 30. They that tarry long at the wine] Hebrew, lamakharim al hay- 
yayin, 'to those tarrying (staying behind) at the wine.' The Lxx. has ou ton 
enchronizontb nen oinois, 'are not (the eyes) of those staying long time among 
wines ? ' The V. has nonne his, qui commorantur in vino ? ' are not (these 
things) to those who pass away their time with wine? ' 

They that go to seek mixed wine] Hebrew, labahim lakhqor mimsak, ' to 
those going to search out mixture,' i. e. fermented yayin made stronger by drugs, 
the whole forming a highly intoxicating compound. The Lxx. has ou ton ichneu- 
onton pou potoi ginontai, 'are not (the eyes) of those haunting (places) where 
drinkings go on ? ' Theodotion has ou tois exerchotnenois tou ereuneesai kerasmata, 
1 are not (the eyes) of those who go about to search after mixed drinks ? ' The V 
reads, et student calicibus epotandis, ' and who apply themselves to drink off their 
cups.' 

V. 31. Look not thou upon the wine when it is red] Hebrew, al- 
tareh yayin ki yithaddam, ' behold not ( = desire not) wine when it is red.' The 
Lxx. gives so widely different a rendering of the passage, that it will be better to 
present it connectedly, and not clause by clause : — (31) Mee methuskesthe en 
oinois, alia homileite anthrbbois dikaiois kai homileite en peripatois ; ean gar eis 
tas phialas kai ta poteeria dbs tous ophthalmous sou, husteron peripateeseis gumno- 
teros huperou. (32) To de eskaton hosper htipo opheds pepleegos ekteinetai kai 
hbspcr hupo ekrastou diacheitai auto ho ios ; 'Be not drunk (or satiated) with 
wines, but converse with just men, and converse in public walks ; for if on the 
bowls and the drinking-cups thou shouldest set thine eyes, afterwards thou shalt 
go about more naked than a pestle. Then, at last, as if smitten by a serpent, he 
stretches himself, and as if (bitten) by a horned serpent, venom is diffused through 
him.' The V. translates the first clause of ver. 31, ne intuearis vinum quando 
fiavescit, 'thou shouldest not look on the wine when it becomes yellow.' But 



PROVERBS, XXIII. 29 — 35. 137 

fiaveo is used to describe the color of ripened corn when the yellow acquires a 
reddish tinge. 

When it giveth his color in the cup] Hebrew, ki yittan bak-kois aino, 
* when it gives in the vessel its eye.' By 'its eye ' is meant the bubble or spark- 
ling point which modern science has traced to the passing off of the carbonic acid 
gas generated by fermentation. The V. has cum splenduerit in vitro color ejus, 
'when its color glitters in the glass.' 

When it moveth itself aright] Hebrew, yithhollak be-maishahrim, * (when) 
it moves in straight lines. ' The gas ascending is another indication of fermenta- 
tion. 4 ' The V. has ingreditur blande, 'it goes in pleasantly.' 

V. 32. At the last] Hebrew, akharitho, ' at its latter end ' = in its issue, 
when its action is carried on to the end. The V. has sed in novissimo, ' but in its 
extreme.' 

It biteth like a serpent] Hebrew, ke-nakhash yish-shak, * like a serpent 
it will bite. ' The same word is used of the biting of the fiery serpents in the 
wilderness (Numb. xxi. 6). The V. has mordebit ut coluber, ' it will bite like a 
snake.' In Deut. xxxii. 33, intoxicating wine is expressly called 'venom' and 
'poison ' ; here the same idea is asserted by a comparison. t 

And stingeth like an adder] Hebrew, uk-tziphoni yaphrash, 'and like 
a viper it pierces.' The V. has et sicut regulus venena diffundet, 'and like a 
basilisk it will pour forth poisons.' 

V. 33. Thine eyes shall behold strange women] Hebrew, aineikah 
yiru zahroth, 'thine eyes shall behold ( = desire) strange women ( = harlots).' 
The Lxx. has oi ophthalmoi sou hotan iddsin allotrian, ' thy eyes when they shall 
behold a strange woman ' ; the V., oculi tui videbunt extraneas, ' thy eyes shall see 
strange women.' 

And thine heart shall utter perverse things] Hebrew, ve libkah yedabar 
tapukoth, ' and thy heart shall set forth (or declare) deceits ' ; the Lxx. to stoma sou 
tote laleesei skolia, 'thy mouth then shall speak perverse things.' Symmachus has 
strebla, 'twisted things.' The V. reads, et cor tmim loquetur perversa, 'and thy 
heart shall utter perverse things.' 

V. 34. Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth down, etc.] Hebrew, ve- 
hayitha ke-shokav belev-yam uk-shokab be-rosk khobal, ' and thou shalt be like one 
lying down in the heart ( = midst) of the sea, and like one lying down on the top 
of a mast.' The Lxx. reads, kai katakaisee hosper en kardia thalassees kai hosper 

* Baron von Liebig, in his 'Chemical Letters,' unconsciously gives a striking testimony to the 
descriptive accuracy of this text : — " The fermentation of grape-juice begins with a chemical action. 
Oxygen is absorbed from the air ; the juice then becomes colored and turbid (by the falling of the 
albumen, and the rising of the gas), and the fermentation commences only with the appearance of 
this precipitate." 

t We give a single example of the almost incredible carelessness with which one entire aspect of 
divine truth is sometimes ignored by its professional interpreters : — 

"What does 'wine' stand for? Everywhere it is associated with ideas of cheerftdness and joy. 
It maketh glad the heart of man. If bread stands for everything which sustains strength, wine 
stands for everything which is genial, and getierous, and animating. It gives fresh life to the faint 
and the weary : it gives liealth and vigor to the sick ; and the light-hearted drink it in their 
brightest and happiest hours." — Article on tlie Lords Stepper in ' Evangelical Magazine? Jtdy 
1867. 

The sentence begins with the fallacy of using a general term 'wine,' as if it were a single tiring, 
of one quality alone, and then proceeds to explicitly contradict everything asserted of ' wine, the 
mocker,' by the inspired preacher! For sorrow we have joy, for babbling we have 'cheerful' 
hours, for wounds and discolored countenance we have gladness of heart, for the serpent's 
poison we have fresh life, for polluted and polluting sensuality we have genial and happy moments, 
for perverse utterances and insensibility to shame and pain, we have at last health, vigor, and 
light-heartedness ! 

18 



138 PROVERBS, XXIII. 29 — 35. 

kuberneetees en polio kludoni, ' and thou shalt lie down as in the heart of the sea, 
and as a pilot in a heavy storm. ' The V. has et eris sicut dormiens in medio mari 
et quasi sopilus gubemator amisso clavo, ' and thou shalt be as one asleep in the 
midst of the sea, and as a steersman fast asleep when the helm is let slip.' 

V. 35. They have stricken me, shalt thou say, and I was not sick] 
Hebrew, hekkuni val-khahlithi, ' they have stricken me, nothing have I cared ' = 
been affected or pained by it. The Lxx. reads, ereis de tuptousin me kai ouk eponesa, 
'and thou shalt say, They smote me, and I was not pained'; the V., et dices, ver- 
beraverunt me, sed non dolui, 'and thou shalt say, They have beaten me, but I 
have not ached.' 

They have me beaten, and I felt it not] Hebrew, halamuni, bal-yadahti, 
'they have beaten me, nothing have I known (of it).' The Lxx. reads, kai ene- 
paixan ?noi, ego de ouk eedein, ' and they mocked me, but I knew it not ' ; the V., 
traxerunt ?ne et ego non sensi, ' they drew me, and I felt not.' 

When shall I awake? I will seek it yet again] Hebrew, mahtkai ahquitz 
osiph avaqshennu od, 'when I am roused I will gather myself up, I will seek it 
again'; the Lxx., pote orthros estai, hina elthon zeeteeso meth''dn suneleusomai, 
' when will it be morning, that going out I may seek those with whom I may keep 
company ?' The V. has quando evigilabo, et rursus vina reperiam ? ' when shall I 
wake, and again find out wines ? ' 

The whole of this important passage may be thus translated (following the 
Hebrew text) : — " Who has lamentation ? who has sorrow ? who has strifes ? who 
has brawling ? who has unnecessary wounds ? who has dark discolored eyes ? Those 
who tarry long at the wine, those who go to seek out mixed wine. Gaze not on 
wine when it is red, when it gives its bubble in the cup, when it moves itself 
straightly ; for the end of it is that it bites like a serpent and pierces like an adder. 
[If thou dost give thyself to it] thine eyes shall gaze upon abandoned women, and 
thine heart shall devise deceits. And thou shalt be like one lying in the midst of 
the sea, and like one lying on the top of a mast ; [and thou wilt say — ] They have 
stricken me, but I have not cared; they have beaten me, but I was not aware. 
When I am roused, I will gather myself up and seek it yet again." 



I. The form of this passage is finely and forcibly dramatic. We are to imagine 
the Wise man musing on the varied characters and classes of mankind, till the 
vision of an object in whom is concentrated every species of misery rises before 
him, and he asks, in tones of pity and surprise (ver. 29), "To whom, to what 
men — to what class of men — belong this cry of lament, this load of sorrow, this 
train of strife, this brawling din, these needless wounds, these eyes encircled with 
livid marks?" And the answer is at hand (ver. 30), — "Those are the men — 
those who are sitting long and late over the wine ; those who are hurrying to and 
fro to seek wine mixed with drugs, to make it more pungent to the palate, and 
more burning to the brain." To such slaves of drink the royal Preacher points 
his hearers, and then, turning round, he emphatically exhorts (ver. 31) that each of 
them would avoid the cause of such shame and suffering, — not so much as looking 
with a longing eye upon the wine when it has become corrupted and corrupting — 
red in color, bubbling on its surface, and moving up and down in straight lines. 
There, he declares (ver. 31), dwell the serpent's fascination and the serpent's 
fangs. Neglecting this wise counsel, he tells the listener (ver. 33 — 35) that he 
will be in danger of looking with a wistful eye on the common prostitute, of making 



PROVERBS, XXIII. 29 — 35. 139 

his heart a store-room of deceit, and of resembling the man who lies in the bed of 
the sea or on the topmost mast, rolling hither and thither without any self-control, 
and confessing that he is insensible to every correction, and that he will only raise 
himself from his lethargy in order to seek again the cause of all his woes. 

2. The passage is divisible into four parts, — (1) the internal and external effects 
of drinking habits; (2) the signs and nature of intoxicating liquor; (3) its demoral- 
izing influences ; (4) the lessons to be drawn and practised. 

In the first place, tipplers and lovers of strong drink are miserable — contentious 
in deed and word — subject to marks of violence — betraying their habits by their 
disfigured faces. 

In the second place, the signs of fermented wine are described, so that the yayin 
of this passage is clearly distinguished from all yayin of a different kind. To make 
this point better understood a figure is introduced ; and this yayin is personified as 
a serpent and adder, bright as the reddest wine, with an eye sparkling as the wine- 
bubble, and with a power of biting and piercing those who are beftrayed into a near 
approach. 

In the third place, the demoralizing influences of intoxicating liquor are enume- 
rated, — lust, deceitfulness, want of self-control, incorrigibility, and the insatiate 
thirst that madly hankers after and pursues the drinker's own worst foe. 

In the fourth place, the one great lesson to be drawn is condensed into the words, 
' Look not upon such wine ' : a precept which is to be observed as literally as can 
be : for to cast eyes often on what is seductive is to run a risk of seduction : but 
principally it is to be obeyed in the sense of not looking for and desiring intoxicat- 
ing liquors, but desiring rather their absence and exclusion. 

3. The plea that Solomon here warns against drunkenness only, or the excessive 
use of intoxicating drink, is contrary to the terms and spirit of the passage. 
Drinking, in the sense of intoxication, is not necessarily implied at all ; and it is 
not intoxication, but wine, that is described in ver. 31 ; nor can intoxication be said 
to bite at the last. It is manifestly the design of the Wise man to point out the 
physical cause of all the misery and mischief he portrays, and this he finds in 
the nature of intoxicating liquor, and hence both reason and inspiration constrain 
him to counsel abstinence even from the desire of an article in which a capacity 
and tendency of such hurtfulrtess essentially inhere. When men learn that alco- 
holic drink abuses them they will cease to talk of the virtue of not abusing it. This 
fundamental difference, residing in the nature of things, was discerned by Solomon, 
and it involves that practical distinction which he makes, and which the Temper- 
ance reformation embodies and proclaims. It is the nature of strong drink to 
deceive and injure man, therefore it ought not to be desired or drunk. Man may 
abuse the good, the bad abuses him ; therefore he should disuse it. If there is a 
flaw in this philosophy it is to be found in the writings of Solomon; and those who 
object to the premiss, 'Intoxicating drink is not good,' or to the inference, 
'Therefore it should not be consumed,' ought first to settle their difference with 
the wisest of men, whose teaching is identical with that of the Temperance system. 
All, indeed, that can be claimed for that system is a revival of Solomon's doctrine 
concerning intoxicating drink, and an organized attempt to bring the habits of 
society into conformity with the wisdom of the Jewish sage. 



140 PROVERBS, XXV. 1 6, 20 — 22. 

Chapter XXIV. Verse 30. 

I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man 
void of understanding. 

By the field . . . and by the vineyard] Hebrew, al-seda . . . veal 
kerem, 'by the field . . . and by the plantation.' Here sedeh, an open field, 
is distinguished from the inclosure, kerem, devoted to the cultivation of the vine 
and other fruits. It is of the latter that the picture of desolation is drawn in ver. 31 
—overgrown with thorns and nettles, and the stone wall broken down. 



Chapter XXV. Verse 16. 



Hast thou found honey ? eat so much as is sufficient for thee, lest 
thou be filled therewith, and vomit it. 



Hast thou found honey?] Hebrew, devash matzahthah, 'honey hast thou 
found?' [As to devash, see Note on Gen. xliii. 11.] 

Lest thou be filled therewith] Hebrew, pen-tishbahennu, ' lest thou be 
satiated therewith.' Sah-bah or sah-baah, signifies \ to be satisfied to the full ' ; and 
is generally connected with food in the same relation as rahvah and shahkar with 
drink and sweet liquors. 



Luscious things are to be taken in moderation, with strict adaptation to natural 
wants. Excess is to be avoided, and a caution against this excess is here con- 
veyed. This evinces that it is a mistake to suppose that a warning against 
excess implies intoxicating quality in the object. The use of sweet wines in a dis- 
gusting excess by the Roman ladies is satirized by Juvenal, though it was not 
attended by inebriation, but by such vomiting as the free use of honey is calculated 
to excite. 



Chapter XXV. Verse 20. 



As he that taketh away a garment in cold weather, and as vinegar 
upon nitre, so is he that singeth songs to an heavy heart. 



Vinegar upon nitre] Hebrew, khometz al natker, 'fermented drink («= 
vinegar) upon nitre.' This nitre is not the saltpetre of commerce, but a species of 
potash, which, when compounded with oil, is used in the East as a soap. It is 
found mixed with the soil in some parts of Syria. Vinegar poured upon this 
substance makes it effervesce (in the Eastern sense ' ferment '), and this fact is an apt 
representation of the incongruity involved in singing jovial songs to a heavy heart, 
the only result of which can be to excite a disagreeable fermentation and irritation 
of the spirits. The Lxx. reads, ' as vinegar draws a sore, so trouble befalling the 
body afflicts the heart.' 

Chaptr XXV. Verse 21, 22. 

21 If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread to eat ; and if he be 
thirsty, give him water to drink : 22 For thou shalt heap coals of fire 
upon his head, and the Lord shall reward thee. 



PROVERBS, XXV. 25, 27. 141 

V. 22. Give him water to drink] Hebrew, hashqahu maim, ' give him to 
drink water.' 

No drink equals water for the assuaging of thirst, and generally all liquids 
relieve thirst by virtue of the water they contain. Alcohol, as an irritant and 
thickener of the blood, creates thirst in proportion to its potency and quantity. 
On account of their pre-eminent value, bread and water are the fittest representa- 
tives of all the materials of physical subsistence. 



Chapter XXV. Verse 25. 

As cold waters to a thirsty soul, so is good news from a far 
country. 



As cold waters TO A thirsty soul] Hebrew, maim qahrim al-nephesh aiphah, 
cold water to a soul (which is) wearily athirst ' = languishing from thirst. 



The comparative structure of the proverb is, perhaps, more striking in the 
Hebrew than as presented in the A. V. — ' cold water to a soul wearily athirst, 
and good news from a far country.' In the heat of a Syrian summer, inexpressibly 
refreshing, even like good news from a friend in a distant land, is cool water to the 
parched and fainting frame. 



Chapter XXV. Verse 27. 

// is not good to eat much honey : so for men to search their own 
glory is not glory. 



It is not good to eat much honey] Hebrew, ahkol devash harboth lo tav, 
' to eat much honey is not good.' The Lxx. reads, ' to eat much honey is not good, 
but to honor venerable sayings is right.' The V. has 'as it is not good to a 
man to eat much honey, so he who is a searcher of majesty shall be oppressed by 
glory.' 



That which is good^f se is not good to the user if used in excess ; but any use of 
that which is not good is an act of excess. Honey is good for food, but taken in 
large quantities is not assimilated as food, and is then not good. The chronicler 
says that many English under Prince Edward, in Palestine, died from a neglect of 
this caution. [See Note on xxv. 16.] The whole proverb reads thus : — 'To eat 
much honey is not good, and to search out their glory, glory.' The comparison 
is obscure to the modern mind. The A. V. supplies 'not' before the second 
* glory' to agree with 'not good' in the first clause. Others propose to read 
interrogatively — ' is it glory ? ' Possibly there is a designed play upon the word 
kabod, which signifies both ' glory ' and 'heaviness ' ; so that the sense would be, 
" as eating honey in excess is not good, but oppressive to the stomach, so when 
men make their own glory an object of search, they are apt to get heaviness for 
their pains. ' ' The vain-glorious are subject to mortifications that weigh like burdens 
upon their hearts. 



142 PROVERBS, XXXI. 4, 5. 

Chapter XXVI. Verse 9. 
As a thorn goeth up into the hand of a drunkard, so is a parable 
in the mouth of fools. 



AS A THORN GOETH UP INTO THE HAND OF A DRUNKARD] Hebrew, khoakh 

ahlah ve-yad shikkor, 'a thorn goeth into the hand of a drunkard.' The Lxx. has 
akanthai phuontai en cheiri methtisoic, douleia de en cheiri ton aphronon, 'thorns 
grow in the hand of a drunkard, but servitude in the hand of the fools.' The V. 
has quomodo si spina nascaturin manu temulenti, sic parabola in ore stultorum, 'as 
if a thorn should grow in the hand of a drunkard, so is a parable in the mouth of 
fools.' 



A drunkard not knowing how to grasp a thorn, or mistaking it for something 
else, it runs into his hand and injures him; so a fool not knowing how to use a 
proverb can only abuse it so as to bring ridicule on himself or affront others. 
Some commentators understand a reference to the insensibility of the drunkard 
when injuring himself, as illustrative cf the ignorance of the fool who uncon- 
sciously misapplies the wisest sayings. 



Chapter XXVI. Verse 21. 
As coals are to burning coals, and wood to fire ; so is a conten- 
tious man to kindle strife. 



The Arabic reads, ' scurrility is of wine, wood is for the fire, and a litigious man 
for the raising up of strife ' = wine acts as fuel to scurrility, as wood to a fire, and 
a quarrelsome man to strife. 



Chapter XXVII. Verse 9. 
Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart; so doth the sweetness. of 
a man's friend by hearty counsel. 



Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart] The Lxx., which' is followed 
by the Arabic, reads., ' the heart delights in ointments, and in wines (kai oinois) 
and perfumes.' 



Chapter XXXI. Verses 4, 5. 
4 It is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine ; 
nor for princes strong drink : 5 Lest they drink, and forget the law, 
and pervert the judgment of any of the afflicted. 



The Hebrew of the received text is as follows : — al lam-melakim Lemoal, al 
lam-melakim shethoyayin ul-rozenim av skakar ; pen-yishteh ve-yishkakh mekhuqqaq 
vishannek din kahl benai oni: 'not for kings, Lemuel, not for kings (is it) to drink 
wine, and (not) for princes desire of strong drink; lest they should drink and 
forget what is decreed ( = the law), and change ( = subvert) the judgment of any 
of the children of affliction.' Instead of av, 'desire,' some MSS. have at, 'where ' ; 
which, if adopted, would make the passage read, ' and for princes (it is not to ask) 
where (is) strong drink, lest,' etc. The T. reads, ' hold thyself aloof from kings, 

*That is, the judgment due to such. 



PROVERBS, XXXI. 6, 7. 143 

Lemuel, from kings who drink wine, and mighty ones who drink strong drink ; lest 
perchance thou shouldst drink and pervert thy cause, and change the judgments 
of any of the children of the poor.' The Syriac runs, 'of kings, Lemuel, beware, 
of kings, I say, who drink wine, and of princes who drink strong drink ; lest per- 
chance thou shouldst forget to declare the law, and by forgetfulness shouldst sur- 
render the cause of any children of the poor. ' In the ' Jewish School and Family 
Bible ' Dr Benisch, a learned rabbi of Great Britain, gives the following translation : 

* it is not for kings, O Lemuel, it is not for kings to drink wine, nor for princes to 
covet strong drink ; lest they drink and forget what is established, and alter the verdict 
of any of the afflicted. ' Differing in some respects from these renderings are those of 
the Lxx. and the V., and most notably the Lxx. : meta boulees panta poiei, meta 
boulees oinopotei. Oi ditnastai thumodeis eisin ; oinon de mee peinetosan, hina mee 
piontes epilathontai tees sophias kai ortha kreinai ou mee dunontai tous astheneis : 

* with counsel do all things, with counsel drink wine. The princes are prone to 
anger, let them then not drink wine, in order that they may not forget wisdom 
when drinking, and may not be able rightly to judge the weak.' Aquila and 
Theodotion give 'and shall change the judgment of the sons of the poor man.' 
The V. is noli regions, O Lemuel, noli regibus dare vinum ; quia nullum secretum est 
ubi regnat ebrietas ; et ne forte bibant et obliviscantur judiciorum, et mutent causam 
filiorum pauperis ; '■ be thou unwilling, O Lemuel, be unwilling to give wine to 
kings ; because nothing is secret where ebriety reigns and lest perchance they 
should drink and be forgetful of judicial rules, and should change the cause of the 
children of the poor. 

Obs. It is now impossible to explain the introduction of the curious prefix 
contained in the Lxx., 'do all things with counsel, with counsel drink wine.'' 
Possibly it may have once formed a marginal note, and have been incorporated 
with the text by some subsequent but very early transcriber. It is observable that no 
such unwise limitation is to be found in the Hebrew of this or any other inspired 
text. All the versions agree in the injunction against the use of wine by kings and 
princes, and in the reason assigned for the injunction — namely, the danger that by 
using wine they should be unfitted for their judicial duties, which, in ancient 
times, kings frequently discharged in person. Probably we have in this passage 
of Holy Writ a fragment of the ' wisdom of Egypt ' which is said to have incul- 
cated abstinence from intoxicating drink upon the Pharaohs. [See Note on Gen. 
xl. 11.] Nothing is known of Lemuel or of his mother, the ostensible speaker. 
Some critics think that the first ten verses of this chapter form a short ethical 
lesson, originally addressed to an Arabian king. Whatever force is contained in 
the reason assigned for abstinence in rulers and judges under the old dispensation, 
is applicable {a fortiori) to every position in Christian life where the possession of 
a clear, sound judgment is needed ; and what are the circumstances where such a 
blessing can be wisely rejected or imperilled? 



Chapter XXXI. Verses 6, 7. 
6 Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine 
unto those that be of heavy hearts. 7 Let him drink, and forget his 
poverty, and remember his misery no more. 



The Hebrew is as follows : — lenu shakar le-ovad ve-yayin Ihnahrai naphesh, 
yishteh ve-yishkakh risho, vaamahlo lo yizkar od: ' give strong drink to the 



144 PROVERBS, XXXI. 6, 7. 

perishing one, and wine to those bitter of spirit; let him drink and forget his 
poverty, and his sorrow not remember again.' The T. reads, 'give strong 
drink to the mournful, and wine to those who are bitter in soul ; that they may 
drink and forget their indigence, and not longer remember their mean attire.' 
The Syriac has ' let strong drink be granted to the mournful, and wine to those 
of bitter soul ; that they may drink and forget their sorrows, and may not further 
recall their calamities.' The Lxx. has didote metheen tois en lupais, kai oinon 
peinein tois en odunais, hina epilathontai tees penias kai ton ponon me mneesthosin 
eti: 'give ye strong drink to those in griefs, and wine to drink to those in pains, 
in order that they may be forgetful of the poverty, and of their troubles have no 
remembrance any more.' The V. reads, date siceram mcerentibus et vinum his 
qui amaro sunt animo. Bibant et ebliviscantur egestaiis suce, et doloris sui non 
recordentur amplius: ' give ye strong drink to the mournful, and wine to those 
who are of bitter soul. Let them drink and forget their indigence, and of their 
grief have not a remembrance any longer.' So far as the words go, we have 
here a plain prescription to ' drown sorrow in drink ' ; but we may well question 
whether such could have ever been the intention of an inspired writer. To deter- 
mine the true meaning of these verses, therefore, is of considerable importance, 
both as a point of morals and of Temperance doctrine. 

1. Some regard the passage as an allusion to the exceptional practice of giving 
intoxicating and stupefying potions to criminals before execution : but the allusion, 
if such, is a sanction and even command ; and the pious mind must revolt from the 
thought of a Scripture exhortation to make men drunk and unconscious at the 
approach of death. The great Exemplar, when about to die, was offered ' wine 
mingled with myrrh,' but it is recorded that He refused it. Could the 'Spirit 
that was in Christ' ever have testified adversely to this ? 

2. The theory that what is recommended is a moderate use of intoxicating liquor 
as a cordial* in time of trouble, is contrary to the natural sense of the words and to 
the result described — complete oblivion of earthly care. Besides, can intoxicating 
drink be properly recommended in any quantity as an antidote to trouble ? Han- 
nah did not think so (see Note on 1 Sam. i. 15). St James writes, ' Is any 
afflicted ? let him pray ' — not fly to the bottle. All experience shows that to use 
alcoholic fluid for mitigating grief is to subject one's self to a special danger, 
amounting to moral certainty, of contracting habits of intemperance. Under such 
conditions the system is doubly susceptible of the delusive influence of alcoholics. 

3. If the passage is to be construed as a serious recommendation, it is nothing 
short of a direct injunction to get intoxicated; advice which could not fail to be 
stigmatised (1) as most irrational, because certain to multiply care and trouble; 
(2) as radically opposed to the tenor of Scripture teaching; and (3) as utterly 
immoral, by giving encouragement to the mother and mistress of all the lowest 
vices of mankind. 

4. An attempt has been made to cut the knot by translating the principal 
terms so as to exclude all reference to wine and strong drink. It is true that by 
falling back upon mere etymology, and rendering yayin 'pressure,' and shakar 
'reward,' 'bribe,' or 'gift,' an entirely new turn is given to the passage, which is 
thus paraphrased: — " It is not for kings and princes to receive gifts or bribes, lest 
(so accepting) they forget the law, pervert the claim of any of the afflicted. Give 
gifts (rather) to him that is ready to perish, and to those that be of heavy heart; 



PROVERBS, XXXI, 6, 7. 1 45 

let him accept [orig. drink] them, and forget his poverty, and remember his misery 
no more." It cannot, however, be supposed that gifts to kings and princes are 
indiscriminately to be condemned, or that indiscriminate almsgiving to the poor is 
to be commended. Besides, the critical objections to this new translation are 
insuperable. (1) Yayin is never elsewhere used in the sense imparted to it; and 
what can be meant by giving ' pressure ' to the poor ? (2) The connection of yayin 
with shakar determines the meaning of shakar beyond all fair question.* (3) The 
allusion to drinking as a cause of loss of judgment and memory is too clear to be 
mistaken. 

5. Any interpretation of verses 6 and 7 which is to preserve their harmony with 
morality and religion, must exclude from the initial word tenu, 'give thou,' the 
force of a recommendation or command. (1) It may be regarded as logical, and 
not mandatory ; not as 'do give,' but 'should you give,' then such and such will 
be the result. The sense would then be tantamount to this : — 'It is not becoming 
in kings and princes to drink wine and strong drink, lest they forget the law and 
pervert the rights of others ; though, should such drink be given to the afflicted, 
they will simply drink and forget their own cares and become unconscious of their 
own misfortunes.' The grammatical concord supports this view; for it is not 
' Give wine and strong drink to the afflicted, and make them forget their troubles,' 
but ' Give them wine and strong drink, and the afflicted one will drink (viskteh), 
and he will forget (yishkekh) his distress.' This usus loquendi is to be found in 
the proverbs of all languages. In our own we say, ' Set a beggar on horseback, 
[not meaning 'do set him,' but 'if you set him,' then\ he will ride to perdition.' 
' Give some people an inch, and they will take an ell. ' This may be defined as 
the logical imperative, in distinction from the ethical. (2) The imperative tenu, 
'give thou,' maybe regarded as a term of conditional comparison. Kings and 
princes (verses 4 and 5) are not to use wine and strong drink because inimical to 
mental clearness and judicial integrity; but if not fit for those who owe important 
duties towards others, what are they fit for ? The answer is supplied (verses 6 
and 7) : ' Give them — if at all — to the perishing and careworn, who will find in 
them oblivion from the very memory of their sorrows.' This, observe, is not a 
contradiction, but an amplification, of the thought developed in verses 4 and 5. 
The alternative advice of the text may be thus modernly expressed: — "Better 
drink so that you forget your own cares, than, occupying a position of influence 
and trust, you should drink and do injury to others.'''' The whole passage may be 
viewed as a declarative medal; on whose obverse side is inscribed, "Intoxicating 
liquors are not fit for those who have to think and act for others " ; on the reverse, 
" Intoxicating liquors are only fit for those who wish to lose the power of think- 
ing and acting for themselves." Can any stronger condemnation be passed upon 
inebriating compounds of every name? To whom has the Creator given per- 



*The Masorites — so called because about the seventh century of the Christian era they accen- 
tuated and otherwise edited the Hebrew Scriptures according to masora (tradition)^-discriminate 
between sh-k-r as 'strong drink' and sh-k-r as 'reward' or 'wages,' by so marking the latter 
'sh' that it may be pronounced ' s,' — sah-kar. Whether they are right or not in so doing, any 
reader, however ignorant of Hebrew, might see that the words do express very different things, 
and that the context in every case supports the distinction made by the English translators. 
Possibly the use of sh-k-r in the sense of ' reward ' or ' wages ' was derived from the generic sense 
of ' sweetness ' : but the distinction must have been made at a very remote period, and when made, 
a difference of pronunciation (which the Masorites may have preserved) would naturally be adopted 
to indicate the difference of object present to the mind. 

19 



146 PROVERBS, XXXI. 1 6. 

mission to drown affliction in the wine-cup ? With a voice of infinite pity, 
the Son of God, addressing the afflicted and perishing, exclaims, "Come unto 
Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." * 



Chapter XXXI. Verse 16. 

She considereth a field, and buyeth it : with the fruit of her hands 
she planteth a vineyard. 

She planteth a vineyard] Hebrew, nahtah karem, ' she planteth a culti- 
vated enclosure,' or 'sets out a plantation.' Kerem here is distinguished from 
sadeh (in the first clause), 'an open field.' The Lxx. has katepheusen kteema, 
' she planted a possession ' ; the V., plantavit vineam, ' she planted a vineyard.' 

*The late Sir W. a' Beckett, ex-Chief Justice of Victoria, has beautifully expressed the unwisdom 
of seeking consolation in the cup which mocks : 

IN VINO FALSITAS. 

Grief banished by wine will come again, 

And come with a deeper shade, 
Leaving, perchance on the soul a stain, 

Which sorrow had never made. 
Then fill not the tempting glass for me ; 

If mournful, I will not be mad ; 
Better sad, because we are sinful, be, 

Than sinful because we are sad. 



THE BOOK OF ECCLESIASTES. 



Chapter II. Verse 3. 

I sought in mine heart to give myself unto wine, yet acquainting 
mine heart with wisdom ; and to lay hold on folly, till I might see 
what was that good for the sons of men, which they should do under 
the heaven all the days of their life. 



I sought in mine heart to give myself unto wine] Hebrew, tarti ve-libe 
limshok bay-yayin eth-besari, ' I sought in my heart to draw out my body (or flesh) 
with wine.' The Lxx. has kateskepsameen ei hee kardia mou helkusen hos oinos 
een sarka mou, ' and I examined whether my heart would draw, as wine, my flesh ' ; 
the V., cogitavi in corde meo abstrahere a vino carnem meam, 'I thought in my 
heart to withdraw my flesh from wine.' The T. has 'to draw my flesh into the 
house of the banquet of wine.' The Hebrew mahshak signifies 'to draw,' 'to 
continue,' ' to spread ' ; hence Gesenius and others construe the passage — ' I sought 
in my heart to make my body strong with wine.' It would be interesting to know 
how St Jerome came to write a vino, ' from wine.' The bay-yayiu of the Received 
Text can bear this rendering only by taking ' b ' in the infrequent sense of ' against,' 
which could hardly be assigned to it here. 

Yet acquainting mine heart with wisdom] Hebrew, ve-libe nohag bakhak- 
mah, 'and my heart acting (or urging) with wisdom,' or 'cleaving to wisdom.' 
The Lxx. has kai kardia mou hodeegeesen en sophia, ' and my heart guided (me) 
with wisdom'; the V., ut animum meum transferrem ad sapientia??i, devitarem- 
que stultitiam, 'that I might carry over my mind to wisdom, and avoid folly.' 



Chapter II. Verse 4. 

I made me great works; I builded me houses; I planted me 
vineyards. 



I planted me vineyards] Hebrew, nahtati li kerahmim, ' I planted for my- 
self vineyards,' or 'set out plantations.' Ver. 5 has a reference to gannoth 
uphardasim, translated in A. V. ' gardens ' and ' orchards. ' Gannoth, from ganan, 
'to cover,' seems to denote conservatories ; and pardasim, 'paradises,' pleasure- 
grounds — laid out around the royal dwelling. 



I48 ECCLESIASTES, IX. 7. 

Chapter II. Verse 24. 
There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and 
drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labor. 
This also I saw, that it was from the hand of God. 



And drink] Hebrew, ve-shahthath, 'and he has drunk.' The same phrase 
recurs, chap. iii. 13; and one similar, chap. v. 18; viii. 15. 



Chapter VII. Verse 29. 
Lo, this only have I found, that God hath made man upright ; but 
they have sought out many inventions. 



Upright] Hebrew, yahshar, 'straight ' = upright or just. 

Many inventions] Hebrew, khishvonoth rabini, 'many devices.' Revelation as 
well as reason explodes the fallacy of confounding nature with art ; the work done 
by means of Divine power lent us, with the work which, being ' upright ' and 'fit,' 
expresses the Divine will and wisdom. The distinction is a cardinal one in ethics, 
the denial of which would destroy all moral distinctions and responsibility, by 
identifying the moral quality of all actions as equally divine, since there is no power 
that is not of God. [See Note on Acts xvii. 29.] The simple existence of an act 
cannot vindicate its 'uprightness,' which is a relation of adaptedness. 



Not everything that man, ' the reasoning animal,' has contrived, is entitled to the 
distinction of ' reasonable,' much less of a Divine origin. The ' inventions ' of man, 
the offspring of his understanding, must be compared with the standard of that 
natural uprightness according to which he was himself created. The true and final 
test of their uprightness is their fitness to make mankind happier and better. If they 
cannot endure this test they stand condemned in their own nature. It is in vain to 
point to the actual manufacture of intoxicating liquor in almost incomputable 
quantities, and at enormous cost, as a proof that they are designed for use; since, 
if their influence on man's material and moral condition is evil rather than good, 
the application of human intelligence to their preparation is but another evidence 
that though God made man upright, he has abused his faculties by contriving 
inventions that are at once the monuments and the instruments of his shame. 



Chapter IX. Verse 7. 
Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with 
a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works. 



Eat thy bread with joy] Hebrew, ekol besimkhah lakhmekah, 'eat with 
gladness thy bread'; the Lxx., phage en euphrozunee ton arton sou, 'eat with 
joyfulness thy bread'; the V., comede in Icetitia panem tuum, 'eat with gladness 
thy bread.' 

And drink thy wine with a merry heart] Hebrew, u-shtha ve-lev-tov 
yaynekah, ' and drink with a good heart thy wine. ' The Lxx. reads, kai pie en 
kardia agathee oinou sou, ' and drink with a good heart thy wine ' ; the V., et bibe 
cum gaudia vinum tuum, 'and drink with joy thy wine.' The T. represents this 
language as prophetic of what God shall say to the good in the world to come, — 



ECCLESIASTES, X. 1 7, 1 9. 1 49 

"Drink with a joyous heart the wine stored up for thee in the garden of Eden, on 
account of the wine which thou hast mingled for the poor and lonely when athirst." 



Where God accepteth man's works, he is justified in partaking of the Divine 
bounties with a joyful and merry heart, whether the produce of the field or the 
vineyard. The condition that this fruit is good in itself is presupposed, and corn 
which has been mildewed, ox y ay in which has passed into the state of a 'mocker,' 
is excluded from the nature of the case. Those who conclude that the wine 
approved in Scripture must have been intoxicating because said to give pleasure, 
are refuted by this very passage, in which the eating of ' bread ' is associated with 
1 gladness ' — simkhah, — a term descriptive of the highest delight. 



Chapter X. Verse 17. 

Blessed art thou, O land, when thy king is the son of nobles, and 
thy princes eat in due season, for strength, and not for drunkenness. 



And not for drunkenness] Hebrew, ve-lo vashti, 'and not for drinking '= 
carousing, or gluttony. The Lxx. has kai ouk aischuntheesontai, ' and shall not 
be ashamed,' — having evidently read bosku, the third person plural preterite of 
busk, 'to be ashamed.' The V. has et non ad luxuriant, 'and not for luxury.' 
As 'eating' includes 'eating and drinking,' so 'drinking' here includes all table 
excess. 



The rule of eating — for strength, to recruit and benefit the body, and not for 
animal indulgence — is an admirable definition of physical temperance ; and happy 
would be our land, if not its princes only, but its people, would make that rule the 
law of their lives. The ' pleasures of the table ' are not to be discarded in so far 
as they are subservient to the principal purpose of all eating — the health and sup- 
port of the body. Whatever in degree, or kind, is inconsistent with this purpose 
ought to be faithfully and conscientiously rejected. 



Chapter X. Verse 19. 

A feast is made for laughter, and wine maketh merry : but money 
answereth all things. 



A feast is made for laughter] Hebrew, liskhoq osim lekhem, ' for laughter 
they make bread.' So the Lxx., eis gelota poiousin arton, 'for laughter they make 
bread ' ; and the V., in risum faciunt panem. 

And wine maketh merry] Hebrew, ve-yayin yesammakk kkayim, ' and wine 
will rejoice the living.' The Lxx., Codex B, has kaioinon kai elainon tou etiphran- 
theenai zontas, ' and (they make) wine and oil that the living may rejoice.' The V. 
reads, etvinum ut epulentur viventes, 'and wine that the living may feast.' The 
T. reads, ' and the wine which they mingle for the thirsty shall be to them for a 
joy in the age to come.' 

Nothing here said renders it needful to associate the idea of * wine ' with an 
intoxicating quality; and in taking the juice of the grape as God has created it, 
enjoyment and thankfulness may most completely and fitly blend. 



THE BOOK OF CANTICLES, 

OR SONG OF SOLOMON. 



Chapter I. Verse 2. 
For thy love is better than wine. 



Hebrew, tovim dodikah miy-yayin, 'good (are) thy loves above wine.' So the 
Lxx., huper oinon, 'above wine'; and V., vino, 'than wine.' 



Chapter I. Verse 4. 
We will remember thy love more than wine. 



More THAN wine] Hebrew, miy-yayin; Lxx., huper oinon; V., super 



Chapter I. Verse 6. 

They made me the keeper of the vineyards ; but mine own vine- 
yard have I not kept. 



Keeper of the vineyards] Hebrew, notarah eth-hak-keramim, 'keeper of 
the vineyards.' 

Mine own vineyard] Hebrew, karmi shelli, 'my vineyard, that which is 
mine '= even mine. 



Chapter I. Verse 14. 

My beloved is unto me as a cluster of camphire in the vineyards of 
En-gedi. 



A cluster of camphire] Hebrew, eshkol kak-kopher, ' a bunch of cypress ' ; 
the Lxx., kupros, "a shrub or small tree, with whitish odoriferous flowers growing 
in clusters ; the Lawsonia inermis of Linnseus, called kopher in Hebrew [from 
kaphar, 'to cover'], as has been well suggested by Job Simonis, from a powder 
being made of its leaves, with which, when mixed with water, women in the East 
smear over their nails so as to make them of a red color for the sake of orna- 
ment. " — (Gesenius. ) 



CANTICLES, II. 4, 5, 13. 151 

In the vineyards of En-gedi] Hebrew, be-karmai Ain gedi, 'in the vine- 
yards (or plantations) of Engedi.' Ain-gedi (signifying 'the fountain of the kid') 
was the name of a town (probably also of a district) situated near the Dead Sea, 
and abounding in palm trees. Some versions read, 'to those in Gaddi.' 

The Targum of the Canticles is an attempt to convert the imagery of this glowing 
idyl into a relation by Solomon, half historical, half prophetical, concerning the 
Jewish State. One illustrative extract is selected, bearing upon the use of wine in 
the Levitical rites : — " Moses commanded the sons of Aaron, who were priests, that 
they should offer oblations upon the altar, and that they should pour out wine upon 
the oblations. Whence, however, could they procure the wine thus to pour out ? 
How could they get it in that desert place which was not fit to be sowed, and 
where no fig trees, or vines, or pomegranate trees grew ? But they went to the 
vineyard of Engedi, and they brought thence clusters of grapes, and they expressed 
from them wine {v'atzrin min'hon khamar], and they poured out from it upon the 
altar the fourth part of a hin upon each ram." Later on, the T. refers to 'red 
wine and white wine ' (khamar summaq v'khamar khivvar) as having been poured 
out upon the altar. 



Chapter II. Verses 4, 5. 
4 He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me 
was love. 5 Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples : for I am 
sick of love. 



V. 4. To the banqueting house] Hebrew, el baith hay-yayin, ' to the house 
of wine' — a cool recess or cave in the royal gardens. The Lxx., eis oikou tou 
oinou, 'into a house of the wine.' Symmachus, eis ton oinona 'into the wine- 
cellar.' So the V. 

V. 5. Stay me with flagons] Hebrew, samkani ba-ashishoth, 'sustain me 
with cakes-of-grapes.' The Lxx., steer isate me en murois, ' support me with per- 
fumes. ' V. , fulcite me floribus, ' stay me with flowers. ' Symmachus, epanaklinete 
me in anthei, 'make me recline on a flower.' Aquila, steeresate me oinanthon, 
•support me with vine-flowers.' 

[As to ashishoth, see Prel. Dis., and Notes on 2 Sam. vi. 19; I Chron. 
xvi. 3.] 

Comfort me with apples] Hebrew, rapduni bat-tapukhim, * refresh me with 
apples.' The Hebrew tapuakh had a width of meaning like the Latin pomum, in- 
cluding all round apple-like fruit, such as the peach, melon, citron. Lxx., stoi- 
basate me en meelois, 'stay me with quinces.' V., stipate me malis, 'fill me with 
apples.' 



Chapter II. Verse 13. 
The fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the 
tender grape give a good smell. Arise, my love, my fair one, and 
come away. 



And the vines with the tender grape give a good smell] Hebrew, 
v%-hag-gephanim semahdar, nathnu raiakh, 'and the vines (are in) blossom, they 
give forth sweet-odor,' The A. V. agrees with the Mishna in taking shnahdar 



152 CANTICLES, V. I. 



to signify 'the tender grape' — the grape first out in bloom. Lxx., ai ampeloi 
kuprizousin edkoan osmeen, 'the vines are in flower, they have given a scent.' 
Symmachus, ton ampelon hee oinanthee, 'the flower of the vines.' V., vinece 
florentes, dederunt odorem suum, ' the vineyards are flowering ; they have given 
their odor.' Pliny (chap. xiv. 2) states that no odor excels in pleasantness that 
of the flowering vine, ubicumquc pubescentium odori nulla suavitas prefertur. 



Chapter II. Verse 15. 
Take us the foxes, the little foxes, that spoil the vines : for our vines 
have tender grapes. 

The foxes] Hebrew, shuahlim, 'jackals,' which abounded in Palestine. 
Lxx. alopekas, V. vulpes, 'foxes.' Aristophanes compares soldiers who despoil 
countries to foxes who spoil vineyards ; and Galen says that hunters eat foxes 
fattened on autumnal grapes. The Syrian jackal is as great a spoiler of vineyards 
as the common fox elsewhere. 

The vines] Hebrew, kerakmim, 'vineyards.' The shuahlim 'spoil' — lay 
waste — not only particular vines, but whole vineyards. 

For our vines have tender grapes] Hebrew, u-keramainu semahdar, ' and 
our vineyards (are in) blossom.' Lxx., kuprizousai, 'are flowering.' V., floruit, 
' is flowering. ' 



Chapter IV. Verse 10. 
How much better is thy love than wine ! 



THAN wine] Hebrew, miy-yayin, 'above wine' (as in chap. i. 2). 



Chapter V. Verse i. 
I am come into my garden, my sister, my spouse : I have gathered 
my myrrh with my spice; I have eaten my honeycomb with my 
honey'; I have drunk my wine with my milk: eat, O friends; drink, 
yea, drink abundantly, O beloved. 



I have drunk my wine WITH my milk] Hebrew, shahthithi yayni im kha- 
tahvi, 'I have drunk my wine with my milk.' Lxx., 'I have drunk my wine 
(pinon mou) with my milk.' V., vinum meum, 'my wine.' The pure juice of the 
grape would form a suitable companion beverage with the fresh flowing milk, and 
both might be drunk freely, even by tender women, without injury either to body 
or mind. 

Drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved] Hebrew, shethu ve-shikru 
dodim, 'drink, and drink to fulness, O loved ones.' L,xx.,piete kai methustkeete 
adelphoi, ' drink, and be satiated, O brothers. ' V. , bibite el inebriamini charis- 
simi, 'drink and be filled to the full, ye dearest.' Here, beyond all cavil, the 
Hebrew shakar, the Greek methuo, and the Latin inebrio, have reference to 
4 plentiful drinking ' ; none at all to an intoxicating effect of what is drunk. 



CANTICLES, VII. 2, 7, 8, 9. 1 53 

Chapter VI. Verse ii. 
I went down into the garden of nuts to see the fruits of the valley, 
and to see whether the vine nourished, and the pomegranates budded. 



To SEE whether the vine flourished] Hebrew, liroth hapharkhah hag- 
gephen, * to see the budding of the vine.' Lxx. idein ei eentheesen hee ampelos, 
'to see if the vine is in flower.' V., inspicerem si floruisset vinea, 'that I might 
observe if the vineyard had flowered.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 2. 
Thy navel is like a round goblet, which wanteth not liquor. 



Liquor] Hebrew, ham-mazeg, 'the mixture.' Mezeg is equivalent to mesek, 
and alludes here not to a ' mixture ' composed of intoxicating and inflaming drugs, 
but to such a sweet and healthful potion as Wisdom is said to mingle for her 
friends. [See Note on Prov. ix. 2, 5.] Lxx., krama, 'mixed -liquor.' V., 
poculis, 'in cups.' 

Chapter VII. Verse 7. 
This thy stature is like to a palm tree, and thy breasts to clusters 
of grapes. 

A palm TREE] Hebrew, tahmar. Lxx., phoiniki, ' to a palm tree.' V., 
palmce, 'to a palm tree.' 

The clusters of grapes] Hebrew, le-eshkelotk, 'to clusters.' Lxx., tois 
botrusin, ' to the grape-clusters. ' V., botris, 'to grape-bunches.' Gesenius thinks 
' clusters of dates ' are meant, which would carry out the figure of the palm tree ; 
but analogy supports the A. V. in supplying 'of grapes.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 8. 
I said, I will go up to the palm tree, I will take hold of the boughs 
thereof: now also thy breasts shall be as clusters of the vine, and the 
smell of thy nose like apples. 



As clusters of the vine] Hebrew, ke-eshkeloth hag-gephen, 'as clustered 
branches of the vine.' So the Lxx., hos bo trues tees ampelou, and the V., sicut 
botri vinece. 

Chapter VII. Verse 9. 
And the roof of thy mouth like the best wine for my beloved, that 
goeth down sweetly, causing the lips of those that are asleep to speak. 



And the roof of thy mouth] Hebrew, vl-kkikhak, ' and thy palate.' "The 
palate seems (here) to be delicately put for the moisture of the mouth perceived in 
kisses. ' ' — (Gesenius. ) 



154 CANTICLES, VIII. 2. 



Like the best wine] Hebrew, ke-yayn hat-tov, 'like the wine of the good'= 
like very good wine. Lxx., hos oinos ho agathos, 'as wine, the good (kind)' — ho 
(the) being emphatic; but Codex A is without the ho. V., sicut vinum optimum, 
'as the best wine.' 

That goeth down sweetly] Hebrew, holak le-dodi le-maisharim, 'going 
to my beloved according to straightnesses '= rightly. Lxx., poreuomenos to 
adelphido mou eis euthuteeta, ' going to my kinsman in a straight way.' V., dignum 
dilecto meo ad potandum, ' fit for my beloved to drink.' Symmachus, harmozon to 
agapeeto mou eis euthuteeta, ' fitted to my beloved in a straight line.' 

Causing the lips of those who are asleep to speak] Hebrew, dovav 
siphthai yishanim, ' flowing over the lips of the sleeping.' Lxx., hikanoumenos 
cheilesi mou kai odousin, 'satisfying to my lips and teeth.' V., labiisque et denti- 
bus illius ad ruminandum, 'and (fit for him) to ruminate with his lips and teeth.' 
Symmachus, prostithemenos cheilesi, 'applied to the lips.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 12. 
Let us get up early to the vineyards ; let us see if the vine nourish, 
whether the tender grape appear, and the pomegranates bud forth : 
there will I give thee my loves. 



To THE vineyards] Hebrew, lak-keramim, 'to the vineyards.' 

If the vine flourish] Hebrew, im parkhah hag-gephen, ' whether buds the 
vine'; the Lxx., ei eentheesen hee ampelos, 'if the vine flowers'; V., si florunt 
vineas, 'if the vineyards are in flower.' 

Whether the tender grape appears] Hebrew, pittakh has-shnahdar, 
'(whether) opens out the blossom (or young grape)'; Lxx., eentheesen ho 
kuprismos, '(if) the blossom has flowered'; V., si flores fructus parturiunt, 'if 
the flowers of the fruit put forth.' 

And the pomegranates bud forth] Hebrew, hanatzu harimmonim, 
'(whether) are bright (or flourish) the pomegranates.' [As to Rimmonim, see 
Note on 1 Sam. xiv. 2. ] 



Chapter VIII. Verse 2. 
I would cause thee to drink of spiced wine of the juice of my 
pomegranate. 

Of spiced wine of the juice of my pomegranate] Hebrew, miy-yayin 
hareqakh, ma-asis rimmoni, ' from the wine of the spice, from the fresh juice of 
my pomegranate.' Yayin hareqakh, 'wine of the spice,' is equivalent to 'spiced 
(or seasoned) wine.' Asis is used of the newly expressed juice of the grape [see 
Prel. Dis., and Notes on Joel i. 5 ; iv. 18; Amos ix. 10], but is here applied to the 
fresh juice of the pomegranate. It is doubtful whether 'the juice of my pome- 
granate ' is identical with ' the spiced- wine' ; or whether the yayin was mixed with 
the 'juice of the pomegranate,' and so was rendered ' spiced' ; or whether the yayin 
was otherwise spiced and drunk along with the pomegranate juice. The Lxx. has 
apo oinou tou murepsikou, apo namatos rhoon mou, ' from the myrrhed-wine, from 
my juice [spring] of the pomegranates'; Symmachus, 'from prepared wine'; V., 



CANTICLES, VIII. II, 12. 1 55 

ex vino condito et mitstum malorum granatorum meorum, ' from prepared wine 
and must of my apples.' Instead of 'spiced,' the Syriac and the Arabic have 
'sweetest.' 



Chapter VIII. Verse ii. 
Solomon had a vineyard at Baal-hamon; he let out the vineyard 
unto keepers ; every one for the fruit thereof was to bring a thousand 
pieces of silver. 

A vineyard] Hebrew, kerem, 'vineyard.' 

The vineyard] Hebrew, eth-hak-kerem, 'the vineyard.' 



Chapter VIII. Verse 12. 
My vineyard, which is mine, is before me : thou, O Solomon, 
must have a thousand, and those that keep the fruit thereof two 
hundred. 

My vineyard] Hebrew, karmi, 'my vineyard.' 



THE 

BOOK OF THE PROPHET ISAIAH. 



[Isaiah prophesied about the year 750 b. c] 



Chapter I. Verse 8. 
And the daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a 
lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city. 



As a cottage in a vineyard] Hebrew, kesukkah bekarem, ' as a booth (made 
of leaves and branches) in a vineyard.' 



Chapter I. Verses 16, 17. 
16 Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings 
from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; 17 Learn to do well; seek 
judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the 
widow. 

The real evidence of all repentance, and the essential condition of all acceptance 
with God, is the desire of amendment — a desire which, wherever it exists, neces- 
sarily prompts to the avoidance of known evil and its causes. If the people of this 
nation should sincerely repent of the national sin of intemperance, their abhorrence 
of it would lead them to shun all degrees of it and all participation in its sources ; 
and until this repentance is experienced, all professions of regret, and all efforts to 
palliate the effects or materially to modify the symptoms of the disease, will neither 
satisfy God nor accomplish an abiding cure. 



Chapter I. Verse 22. 
Thy silver is become dross, thy wine mixed with water. 



Thy wine mixed with water] Hebrew, sahvak mahhul barn-maim, 'thy 
soveh is cut with water.' Lxx., oi kapeeloi sou misgousi ton oinon hudati, 'thy 
hucksters (low taverners or vintners) mix the wine with water.' Aquila has 
sumposion sou, 'thy banquet' (drinking-feast) ; Symmachus, ho oinos sou, 'thy 
wine.' The T. has khamraik, ' thy wine ' ; V., vinum tuum mistum est aqua, ' thy 
wine has been mixed with water.' Soveh, = 'that which is eagerly sucked up' 



ISAIAH, III. I. 157 



[see Prel. Dis.], here manifestly denotes some luscious preparation, probably of 
boiled grape-juice. Mah-al, 'to cut,' ' prune,' or ' circumcise,' is a figure for the 
dilution commonly practised by the lower class of liquor venders, who tried to pass 
off a thin watery article for the superior and genuine soveh. The idiom is common 
in the East, and is to be found in the poet Martial (Ep. i. iS),—Jugulare vetat 
Falernum, ' he forbids the Falernian (wine) to have its throat cut ' = to have its 
strength diminished. Dr Gill quotes Gussethts as suggesting that mahal is con- 
tracted from meholal, which signifies 'infatuated,' so that the meaning would be 
'thy wine is infatuated into water.' The erudite author of 'Tirosh lo Yayin ' 
traces to soveh the Latin sapa, which was must boiled down to one-third its 
original bulk, and by an apt quotation from Varro (lib. i., cap. 54) shows how the 
figure of circumcision might come to be applied to wine unduly diluted with water. 
Varro, speaking of grapes that had been trodden and then put under the press, 
adds, " When the must has ceased to flow from the press some persons circumcise 
the extremities (of the grape-mass) and press again, and what results from the 
second pressure they call circumcisitum" — cum desiit sub prelo fluere, quidem 
circumcidunt extrema, et rursus premunt, et rursus cum expressum circumcisitum 
appellant. He also cites Cato (xxiii. 76) as applying to the wine made from a 
similar pressure of grape husks, etc., the name of vinum circumcidaneum, and 
Columella (xii. 36) the name of vinum circumcisivum. 



Chapter II. Verse 8. 
Their land also is full of idols ; they worship the work of their own 
hands, that which their own fingers have made. 



This may be truly said of the monster idols of Great Britain — fermented and 
distilled liquors of every quality, color, and denomination, and of the temples of 
Bacchus and Tobaccos. The land is 'full of them.' Evil drinks occupy tens 
of thousands of breweries, distilleries, warehouses, cellars, and shops, and in 
the more than religious homage which millions pay to them, we have an example, 
the most painful and shameful, of the worship that men render to 'the work of 
their own hands.' 



Chapter III. Verse i. 
For, behold, the Lord, the Lord of hosts, doth take away from 
Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff, the whole stay of 
bread, and the whole stay of water. 



Bread and water are here described as the two stays or supports of physical 
existence — bread, the one typical food; water, the one essential liquid. Unlike 
such imaginary and fictitious supports as alcoholic beverages, these have no ten- 
dency to excite a morbid appetite, and if taken even to excess they can never 
generate moral and social evils of a malignant and destructive kind. The wisdom 
and goodness of God are displayed in withholding from the materials constituting 
our daily sustenance any property prompting to their abuse, and any power, if 
abused, to pervert reason and deprave the soul. He provideth no ' deceitful meat,' 
no drink that 'mocks' and 'deceives.' Articles possessing such characteristics 
must, in reason, be set aside as neither essential nor useful to health and vigor. 



IS 8 ISAIAH, V. I, 2, 3. 

Chapter V. Verse i. 
Now will I sing to my well-beloved a song of my beloved touching 
his vineyard. My well-beloved hath a vineyard in a very fruitful hill. 



Touching his vineyard] Hebrew, le-karmo, * concerning his vineyard.' 
The Lxx. has 'to my vineyard.' 

A vineyard] Hebrew, kerem. So in ver. 6 also. 

In a very fruitful hill] Literally, 'in the horn of the son of fatness.' 
Vines were planted on hill-sides. So Virgil, — ' Bacchus loves the open hills.' 



Chapter V. Verse 2. 
And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted 
it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and 
also made a winepress therein : and he looked that it should bring 
forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes. 



The choicest vine] Hebrew, soraq, 'a noble vine'; Lxx., ampelon soreek 
[Codex A has soreek"], 'a vine sorek.' Aquila and Theodotion have soreek ; but 
Symmachus has eklekteen, which appears in the V. electam 'choice,' — vitem, 'vine,' 
being understood. In a note on this passage St Jerome, while observing that the 
only Greek translator who had rendered soreek by ' choice ' was Symmachus, says 
that it seemed to him he was expressing the sense though breaking the letter of 
the original word, "for the Jews say that sorek is a species of the best vine, which 
yields the juciest and most constant fruit. Whence sorek by some is interpreted 
kallikarpos, which we may translate into pulcherrimos fructus ( ' the most beautiful 
fruits ')." [See Note on Gen. xlix. 11.] 

A winepress] Hebrew, yeqeb, ' a wine-press ' ; Lxx., proleenion ; V., torcular. 

A tower] Hebrew, migdol 'a watch-tower.' These towers are common in all 
Eastern countries in the midst of vineyards and orchards. 

Grapes] Hebrew, anabim, 'grape-bunches'; Lxx., staphuleen, V. uvas, 
'grapes.' 

Wild grapes] Hebrew, beushim, 'bad' or 'vile.' Beushim is from bah-ash, 
' to have a bad smell. ' If beushim refer to a bad species of grapes, we have here 
an example of our idiom when we contrast the 'real' substance with 'rubbish,' 
though both may be the same in nature, and differ only in their quality. "He 
looked that it should bring forth grapes — grapes deserving to be called so ; and it 
brought forth grapes indeed, but of a smell so sickly as to make them unworthy 
of the name." Anabim, grapes, may, however, be contrasted with some spurious 
berries resembling grapes, if at all, in nothing but their outward and clustered 
form. The Lxx. and Theodotion read akanthos, 'thorns 'or 'brambles.' The 
V. has labruscas, ' wild grapes ' = produce of the wild vine. The same terms 
are used in ver. 4. 



Chapter V. Verse 3. 
And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem, and men of Judah, judge, I 
pray you betwixt me and my vineyard. 



My vineyard] Hebrew, karmi, 'my vineyard.' So verses 4 and 5, U-karmi, 
'to my vineyard.' 



ISAIAH, V. 10, II. 159 



The declaration following the text — "What more can I do than I have done? 
saith the Lord" — ought to suggest to modern theorists that educational and 
religious remedies — mere 'moral suasion,' as it is called — are inadequate to the 
cure of intemperance, so long as the drink itself is provided and consumed. This 
passage clearly teaches that the remedy must be special. 



Chapter V. Verse 10. 
Yea, ten acres of vineyard shall yield one bath, and the seed of an 
homer shall yield an ephah. 



Ten acres OF vineyard] Hebrew, azereth tzimdai kerem, * ten yokes of a 
vineyard.' A yoke (tzemed) denotes as much land as a yoke of oxen can plough in 
one day. 

One bath] Hebrew, bath ekhath, 'bath — one,' =7^ English gallons. The 
Lxx., Codices A and B, keramion hen, 'one earthenware jar'; other MSS. have 
baton, 'bath'; V., lagunculam unam, 'one small flagon.' What a proof of a 
failure in the vintage, when the grapes upon ten acres of vines should not yield 
eight gallons of yayin ! 

Chapter V. Verse ii. 
Woe unto them that rise up early in the morning, that they may 
follow strong drink; that continue until night, till wine inflame them ! 



Woe unto them that rise, up early in the morning] Literally, ' woe ' 
or 'lamentation (shall be to) those rising early in the morning,' or 'by day- 
light' 

That they MAY follow strong drink] Hebrew, shakar yirdophu, 'strong 
drink they follow after earnestly,' = pursue. Yirdophu is the future of radaph, 
but the action is plainly described as concurrent in time with the early rising, a 
sense which supports the theory that the so-called future form of the Hebrew verb 
is really expressive of an indefinite present. The Lxx., kai to sikera diokontes, ' and 
are pursuing sic era ' ; V., ad ebrietatem sectandam, ' to pursue inebriation.' The 
T. has ' old wine ' (khamar attiq) ; Aquila and Symmachus have methusma. 

That continue until night, till wine inflame them] (Woe shall be to) 
'those tarrying into night.' Hebrew, yayin yadliqam, 'wine inflames them.' 
Dahlaq signifies 'to burn,' or 'to inflame.' Lxx., ho gar oinos autous sunkausei, 
'for wine will consume them' ; V., utvino mtuetis, 'that ye may be heated with 
wine.' The T. has 'wine of rapine inflames them.' " 'Till wine inflame them,' 
— their bodies with heat and their souls with lust." — (Dr Gill.) Compare with 
this the lines of ' the Cyrensean ' (Callimachus) quoted by Athenseus : — 

ho oinos 
To puri hison echei menos eufan es andras elthee : 
"A force like fire wine uses when 
It enters into strongest men." 

And Bacchylides (Ath. ii. 10) : — 

Thalpee si thumon Ku^ridos : 
" It warms the heart with love's desire." 

It is noticeable that many of the eulogies passed upon wine by the ancient poets 
assume, in the light of divine truth, the form of warnings and reproaches. 



160 ISAIAH, V. 12, 22. 



Chapter V. Verse 12. 
And the harp, and the viol, the tabret, and pipe, and wine, are in 
their feasts : but they regard not the work of the Lord, neither con- 
sider the operation of his hands. 



And wine are in their feasts] Hebrew, va-yayin mishtaihem, 'and wine 
(is) in their drinkings ' = feastings. The Lxx., ion oinon pinousi, 'they drink 
wine'; Syriac, 'they drink wine'; the Arabic, 'they draw in wine'; the V., et 
vinum in conviviis vestris, 'and the wine (is) in your feasts.' 



Chapter V. Verse 22. 
Woe unto them that are mighty to drink wine, and men of strength 
to mingle strong drink ! 



Woe unto them that are mighty to drink wine] Hebrew, hoi gibborim 
lishtoth yayin, 'lamentation (shall be) to those mighty to drink wine'; Lxx., 
ouai oi ischuontes humbn oi peinontes ton oinon, ' woe (is to) the mighty ones of 
you, those drinking the wine ' ; V., vce quipotentes estis ad bibenditm vinum, 'woe 
to you who are mighty to drink wine.' 

And men of strength to mingle strong drink] Hebrew, u' ] anshai-khail 
Iwisok shakar, ' and men of strength (= men who are strong) to mingle strong 
drink'; Lxx., kai oi dunastai oi kerannuntes to sikera, 'and the mighty, those 
mingling the sicera ' ; some MSS. have methtisma ; V., et viri fortes ad miscendam 
eb?'ietatem, 'and men strong to mix inebriation'; the T., 'and men of wealth to 
drench themselves with old (wine).' The Zabian 'Book of Adam,' translated by 
Prof. Norberg in 1815, contains a striking parallelism to, perhaps imitation of, 
verses 20 — 24. The last verse reads, "Woe to them who early drink new wine, 
and in the evening drink that which is old, and are captivated with the song, the 
lyre, and the pipe! " 



Obs. 1. Isaiah, who flourished about 750 years before the birth of Christ, and 
commenced to prophesy in the reign of Uzziah, bears in the above (as in subse- 
quent passages) a powerful testimony concerning the licentiousness and degeneracy 
of his age. Contrary to modern and superficial notions, which confine intem- 
perance to northern climes and exclude it from vine-growing countries, the people 
of Israel, following the example of their chief men, were addicted to the grossest 
indulgence in intoxicating liquors. The juice of the grape (yayin) and the juice of 
other fruits {shakar) were drunk in their fermented state ; and probably both, cer- 
tainly the latter, were mixed with pungent and heady drugs in order to gratify a 
base and insatiable appetite. Men rose up early and sat up late to prosecute these 
vicious indulgences, and they boasted of themselves as ' mighty ' and ' valiant ' in 
proportion as they were able to gulp down large quantities of these compounds, 
and to ' carry their drink well. ' 

2. The attendant, and in no small measure the consequential, evils were of the 
most aggravated kind. The divine works were disregarded (ver. 12), ignorance 
reigned (ver. 13), sin abounded (ver. 18), men's moral conceptions were the oppo- 
site of the truth (ver. 20), self-conceit grew luxuriantly (ver. 21), bribery and 
injustice were rampant (ver. 23). The vengeance of God was awakening against 



ISAIAH, XVI. 8 — 10. l6l 

them, and would take the triple form of famine, pestilence, and invasion, so that 
their supplies of drink would be cut off (ver. 6, 7, 10), the pest-stricken would 
lie in the streets (ver. 25), and hostile nations would ravage the land (ver. 
26—30). 



Chapter VII. Verse 23. 
And it shall come to pass in that day, that every place shall be, 
where there were a thousand vines at a thousand silverlings, it shall 
even be for briers and thorns. 



A thousand VINES AT A THOUSAND silverlings] Hebrew, eleph gepken 
ffeleph keseph, 'a thousand (specimens) of the vine for a thousand (shekels) of 
silver.' The shekel was worth about 2s. 6d. English, and taking this as the cur- 
rent price of a single vine in the time of Isaiah, we gain a glimpse of the plentiful- 
ness and consequent cheapness of vineyard produce. It is so yet in the East. 
For a few pence a person may feast for a day upon the most delicious grapes, and 
other fruits in their season. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 8. 
For the fields of Heshbon languish, and the vine of Sibmah : the 
lords of the heathen have broken down the principal plants thereof, 
they are come even unto Jazer, they wandered through the wilder- 
ness : her branches are stretched out, they are gone over the sea. 



The vine of Sibmah] Hebrew, gephen Sivmah. Gephen, 'vine,' is used 
collectively for gepkanim, 'vines.' Sivmah was a town of the Reubenites, deriv- 
ing its name from siv am, 'coolness,' or ' sweet smell. ' It was celebrated for its 
vines. Lxx., ampelos Sebama, 'the vine of Sebama' ; V., vineam Sebama. 

The principal plants thereof] Hebrew, seruqqeiha, 'her tendrils,' or 
'noble vines.' Seruqqhim is closely related to soraq, as to which see Note on 
chap. v. 1, and Gen. xlix. 11. Lxx., tas ampelous, 'the vines'; V.,flagella ejus, 
'its branches.' 



Chapter XVI. Verse 9. 
Therefore I will bewail with the weeping of Jazer the vine of 
Sibmah : I will water thee with my tears, O Heshbon, and Elealeh : 
for the shouting for thy summer fruits and for thy harvest is fallen. 



I WILL water THEE with MY tears] Hebrew, arayyahvek dimahti, ' I will 
saturate thee with my tears.' The verb is rahvah. Lxx., ' thy trees he has cut 
down ' ; V., inebriabo te lacryma mea ' with my tear I will inebriate ( = saturate) 
thee.' 



Chapter XVI. Verse 10. 
And gladness is taken away, and joy out of the plentiful field; 
and in the vineyards there shall be no singing, neither shall there 
21 



1 62 ISAIAH, XVII. 6, 10. 

be shouting : the treaders shall tread out no wine in their presses 
I have made their vintage shouting to cease. 



Out of the plentiful field] Hebrew, mm hak-karmel, 'from the choice 
field' = garden. [As to karmel, see Note on 2 Kings, xix. 23.] The Lxx., ek ton 
ampelondu, 'from the vineyards ' ; V., de Carmelo, 'from Carmel.' 

And in the vineyards] Hebrew, uvak-keramim ; Lxx., en tois ampelosi ; 
V., en vineis. 

The treaders shall tread out no wine in their presses] Hebrew, 
yayin ba-yeqahvim lo-yidrok had-dorak, ' the treader (dorak) shall not tread wine 
in the presses ' ; Lxx., kai ou mee pateesousin oinon eis ta hupoleenia, 'and they 
shall by no means tread wine into the wine- vats ' ; V., vinum in torculari non 
calcabit qui calcare consueverat, ' he who was accustomed to tread shall not tread 
wine in the wine-press.' Yayin is here applied either to the grapes yielding yayin t 
or to the expressed juice as it flows from under the treader's feet. The treading is 
also said to take place in the yeqeb, showing that the yeqeb included the place of 
treading as well as the reservoir into which the liquor ran. 

I have made their vintage shouting to cease] Hebrew, haidahd hish- 
bati, 'exultation I make to cease.' The words 'their vintage' are supplied by 
the English translators, but the reference is undoubtedly to the sounds of joy with 
which the vintage was gathered. Lxx., pepaulai gar, ' for it has ceased ' ; the V., 
vocem calcantium abstuli, 'I have taken away the voice of the treaders.' 



Chapter XVII. Verse 6. 

Yet gleaning grapes shall be left in it, as the shaking of an olive 
tree, two or three berries in the top of the uppermost bough, four or 
five in the outmost fruitful branches thereof, saith the Lord God of 
Israel. 



Gleaning grapes] Hebrew, ollaloth, 'gleanings.' Lxx. kalamee, and V. 
racemus, point to a reading different from that of the received Hebrew text. 

Two or three berries] Hebrew, shenaim sheloshah gargerim, 'two, three 
berries. ' Gargar denoted a single grape or berry ; anab, a small bunch of grapes ; 
eshkol, a longer stalk containing a collection of bunches, = a cluster. 



Chapter XVII. Verse 10. 

Because thou hast forgotten the God of thy salvation, and hast not 
been mindful of the rock of thy strength, therefore shalt thou plant 
pleasant plants, and shalt set it with strange slips. 



And shalt set it with strange slips] Hebrew, u-zemorath zar tezrahennu, 
'with strange vine-shoots thou shalt set it.' Zemorah, from zah-mar, ' to prune,' 
signifies that which is pruned, = a vine-branch, a shoot. It also occurs Numb, 
xiii. 23; and Ezek. xv. 2. Lxx., 'wherefore thou shalt plant an unfruitful 



ISAIAH, XIX. IO, 14. 163 

plantation" and an unfruitful seed'; V., 'wherefore thou shalt plant a fruitful 
plantation and shalt sow a strange seed ' ; the Syriac, ' wherefore thou shalt plant 
a goodly plant and set it with foreign shoots.' 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 5. 

For afore the harvest, when the bud is perfect, and the sour grape 
is ripening in the flower, he shall both cut off the sprigs with pruning 
hooks, and take away and cut down the branches. 



\ 
The harvest] Hebrew, qahtzir, 'harvest,' or 'vintage,' from qak-tzar, 'to 
cut off.' In this verse the reference is clearly to the vintage season, when the 
grapes were usually separated from the vines by some sharp instrument. Lxx., 
pro tou tkerismou, 'before the harvest'; V., ante messem eum, 'before such 
harvest.' 

And the sour grape] Hebrew, u-voser, 'the unripe grape.' Boser is a col- 
lective noun, denoting grapes fully formed, but still unripe and sour. The word 
occurs also in Jer. xxxi. 29, 30; and Ezek. xviii. 2. Lxx., kai omphax ; V., im- 
matura (uva understood). 

With pruning hooks] Hebrew, bam-mazmaroth, 'with pruning hooks.' 
Mazmara, 'a pruning hook,' is derived from zahmar, 'to prune.' It also occurs 
Isa. ii. 4; and Joel iii. 10. 



Chapter XIX. Verse 10. 

And they shall be broken in the purposes thereof, all that make 
sluices and ponds for fish. 



All that make sluices] Hebrew, kahl osai seker, 'all those making wages ' 
= hired servants. (So Gesenius.) The whole passage is difficult, and the versions 
are exceedingly diversified. The most curious fact is that the Lxx. takes seker (as 
pointed by the Masorites) to be shakar, ' sweet (or strong) drink, ' and renders it by 
zuthos (barley-wine or beer). As the whole paragraph refers to Egypt the Lxx. 
gives shakar this meaning here, and in no other place, because a sort of beer was 
anciently drunk in that country. The clause is thus rendered, — kai pantes oi poi- 
ountes ton zuthon lupeetheesontai kai tas psuchas ponesousin, ' and all that make beer 
shall be grieved and be pained in their souls.' 

The Syriac has 'and all who make sicera for man's drink.' More allied to the 
A.V. is the V., omnes qui faciebant lacunas ad capiendos pisces, ' all who were mak- 
ing pits (or ponds) for catching fish.' The Targum of Jonathan reads, ' and a place 
where they were making ponds and gathering the waters, every one to his own mind.' 
Henderson, after Gesenius, translates the whole verse thus : — ' Her pillars (i. e. 
chief men) are broken down, and all the hired laborers are grieved in mind.' 



Chapter XIX. Verse 14. 

The Lord hath mingled a perverse spirit in the midst thereof: 
and they have caused Egypt to err in every work thereof, as a 
drunken man staggereth in his vomit. 



164 ISAIAH XXII. 13, 24. 

Hath mingled] Hebrew, mahsak 'has mingled.' God is here represented as 
mixing a powerfully intoxicating potion for the Egyptian princes. Lxx. ekerasen t 
V., miscuit, 'has mixed.' 

And they have caused Egypt to err] Hebrew, ve-hithu eth Mitzraim y 
'and they have caused Egypt to wander' or 'go astray'; the Lxx., eplaneesan ; 
V., errare fecerunt. [Consult chap, xxviii. 7; Job xii. 25; and Jer. 1. 6.] 

As A drunken man staggereth in his vomit] Hebrew, ke-hitahoth shikkor 
beqio, 'as the wandering of a drunkard with his vomit'; Lxx., hds planatai ho 
tnethuon kai ho emon ha??ia, ' as wanders he who is drunk and he who vomits to- 
gether ' ; V., sicut errat ebrius et vomens, ' as one strays who is drunk and 
vomiting.' 



Chapter XXI. Verse 5. 
Prepare the table, watch in the watchtower, eat, drink; arise, ye 
princes, and anoint the shield. 



This and the preceding are part of the ' burden ' of Babylon, in which the cap- 
ture of that great city is foreseen and predicted. The intemperate feasting which 
preceded that event and rendered it possible is well known, and will be more par- 
ticularly noticed hereafter. [See Note on Dan. v. 30.] 



Chapter XXI. Verse 14. 
The inhabitants of the land of Tenia brought water to him that 
was thirsty, they prevented with their bread him that fled. 



To the thirsty water was supplied; the one that fled was 'prevented,' i. e. 
anticipated, with bread. Bread and water are here again conjoined as the essen- 
tials of human sustenance. 



Chapter XXII. Verse 13. 
And behold joy and gladness, slaying oxen, and killing sheep, eat- 
ing flesh, and drinking wine : let us eat and drink ; for to-morrow we 
shall die. 



And drinking wine] Hebrew, ve-shathoth yayin, ' and drinking wine ' ; Lxx. 
kai piein oinon, V. et bibere vinum, ' and to drink wine.' 



The concluding clause, 'Let us eat and drink,' etc., expresses a sentiment of 
riotous animalism which had at that early period passed into a proverb, and along 
with the sentiment the proverb descended to later ages. [See Note on 1 Cor. 
xv. 32.] 



Chapter XXII. Verse 24. 
And they shall hang upon him all the glory of his father's house, 
the offspring and the issue, all vessels of small quantity, from the 
vessels of cups, even to all the vessels of flagons. 



ISAIAH, XXIV. 7, 9. 165 



Vessels of cups, . . . vessels of flagons] Hebrew, kelai hah- 
aggahnotk . . . kelai han-nebalim, ' vessels of bowls (or basins), . . . 
vessels of pitchers.' The V. has 'from vessels of bowls {crateraruni) to every 
vessel of musical instruments {musicorum).' The margin of the A. V. has 'or 
instruments of viols.' [The Hebrew nabel (or nebel) denoted articles as widely 
separated in structure and use as the skin-bottle, the pitcher, and the ten-stringed 
harp or lyre (Psa. xxxiii. 2).] The T. applies all these expressions to the employ- 
ment of very young children in the offices of the temple. 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 7. 
The new wine mourneth, the vine languisheth, all the merry- 
hearted do sigh. 



The new wine mourneth] Hebrew, ahval tirosh, 'hung down ( = mourned) 
has the vine-fruit.' The primary senses of ah-val are 'to be languid,' 'to walk 
with the head cast down,' which easily acquire the secondary sense of 'to mourn.' 
Gesenius thus cites the passage, — 'the new wine mourneth,' i. e. 'the chisters 
mourn.' Lxx., pentheesei oinon, 'the wine will mourn'; Aquila, epentheesen ho 
parorismos, ' the fruit out of season has mourned ' ; V., luxit vindemia, ' the vint- 
age has mourned.' The Syriac reads, 'the corn will be turned into grief; the 
Arabic, ' the vine will grieve.' 

The vine languisheth] Hebrew, umlellah gahphen, 'languished has the 
vine'; Lxx., pentheesei ampelos, 'the vine will mourn'; V., infirmata est vitis, 
'the vine has languished away'; the T., 'because the vines are worn away.' 



The prophet introduces us into the vineyard, and speaking of future events as 
having actually transpired — a form frequently adopted in Scripture to give em- 
phasis to prophesy — he points to the tirosh, now approaching maturity, and cries 
out, " The fruit upon the vine has hung down its head, as if mourning for its fate ; 
the vine has languished, as if for very sadness ; all the merry-hearted who have 
been wont to pluck the vintage with delight have sighed over the scene of desola- 
tion before them." The prediction is one of drought. This description fixes the 
meaning of tirosh as definitely as the context could do it. 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 9. 
They shall not drink wine with a song ; strong drink shall be bitter 
to them that drink it. 



They shall not drink wine with a song] Hebrew, bash-shir lo yishtu 
yayin, 'with a song they shall not drink wine; ' Lxx., eeschuntheesan, ouk epion 
oinon, 'they have been ashamed, they have not drunk wine ' ; V., cum cantico non 
bibent vinum, 'with a song they shall not drink wine.' The tirosh having been 
shrivelled up for lack of water, the supply of grape-wine would be cut off. 

Strong drink shall be bitter to them that drink it] Hebrew, yamar 
shakar le-shothahv, 'bitter shall be the sweet-drink to those who drink it' ; Lxx., 
pikron egeneto to sikera tois pinousin, ' bitter has become sicera to those who drink 
(it) ' ; V., amara erit potio bibentibus illam, 'bitter will be drink to those imbibing 
it.' For shakar the T. has attiqah, ' the old ' (wine). 



166 ISAIAH, XXIV. II, 13, 20. 

It admits of question whether the prophet is predicting that the sweet-drink 
should be bitter to the taste, or bitter figuratively on account of the smallness of 
the supply. The severe drought which would cause the grapes to yield no yayin 
would operate so as to make the juices of other fruits lose their sweetness, and to 
be greatly lessened in amount. It is obvious from the contrast of 'sweet' and 
' bitter ' — a contrast wholly obscured in the A. V. translation of shakar as ' strong- 
drink ' — that shakar was valued on account of its sweetness, a quality which disap- 
pears in proportion as the sugar of the juice is decomposed and converted into 
alcohol and carbonic acid gas. [See Note on Gen. i. 29.] Sweet shakar, like 
some sweet wines, might be intoxicating, yet who has not read of the sweet and 
innocent wine of Lesbos, which could be drunk almost in any quantity without 
harm ? And the price put upon shakar for its sweetness, shows that it was not 
mere alcoholic strength which caused its consumption by ancient topers, as im the 
case of the preference shown for ports and sherries by modern wine-drinkers. 



Chapter XXIV. Verse ii. 

There is a crying for wine in the streets; all joy is darkened, the 
mirth of the land is gone. 

There is a crying for wine in the streets] Hebrew, tzevahkhah al hay- 
yayin bakhutzoth, 'an outcry (is) for wine in the outside places ' ; Lxx., ololuzete 
peri ton oinou pantachee, 'howl ye for wine everywhere'; V., clamor erit super 
vino in plateis, 'a cry shall be on account of wine in the town-streets.' 



Yayin may here be representative of the whole produce of the vineyard, the 
fruit of which entered so largely into the diet of the people. But if the outcry was 
for intoxicating drink, what a picture of sensuality and demoralization is pre- 
sented ! 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 13. 
When thus it shall be in the midst of the land among the people, 
there shall be as the shaking of an olive tree, and as the gleaning 
grapes when the vintage is done. 



As the gleaning grapes when the vintage is done] Hebrew, ke-olaloth 
im kahlah vatzir, 'as the gleaning when the cutting is completed.' This 'cutting' 
{vatzir) is equivalent to 'gathering,' which was usually effected, as before ex- 
plained, by the use of a sharp instrument — a pruning-hook. Symmachus has 
has epiphullides ean suntelesthee trugeetos, ' as the small grapes after the harvest is 
concluded ' ; the V., et racemi cum fuerit finita vindemia, 'and the grape-stalks 
when the vintage shall have been ended. ' St Jerome must have read ve-eshkeloth 
instead of ke-olaloth. 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 20. 



The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be 
removed like a cottage; and the transgression thereof shall be heavy 
upon it ; and it shall fall, and not rise again. 



ISAIAH, XXV. 6. 167 



The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard] Hebrew, noa 
tahnua eretz kish-shikkor, ' reeling shall the earth reel like a drunkard. ' Nuah 
signifies 'to vacillate,' 'to swing to and fro.' Lxx., ek linen hos ho methuon 
kai kraipalon, ' it swerves as he who is drunk and sick from a debauch ' ; Theodo- 
tion, said saleutheesetai he gee hos methuon, 'with a shaking the earth shall be 
shaken as one drunk' ; V., agitatione agitabitur terra sicut ebrius, ' with a shaking 
the earth is shaken as a drunken man.' 



Chapter XXV. Verse 6. 

And in this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people 
a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full of 



marrow, of wines on the lees well refined. 



A FEAST OF FAT things] Hebrew, mishta shemahnim, ' a feast of fatnesses ' 
= fat things. We are not to understand fat meat as distinguished from lean, but 
well-fed, prime flesh, with the best quality of food, including the oily ingredients, 
which were highly prized. 

A feast OF wine on THE lees] Hebrew, mishta shemahrim, 'a feast of 
preserves.' From shah-mar, 'to keep,' 'to guard,' 'to take care of,' comes 
shemerim, 'things specially cared' for,' or, as we say, preserves = dainties, con- 
fections. That it means something preserved is not disputed, for Gesenius, who 
approves the rendering of the A. V. in his definition of shemahrim, explains how 
'wine,' which is not named in the Hebrew, is supposed to be referred to: — 
" Shemarim, dregs (of wine), so called because when wine is kept on the lees its 
strength and color are preserved. " But there is no need to conceive an allusion 
either to wines or their refuse. The feast is said to be as much one of shemahrim 
(confections) as of shemahnim (fat things). If any allusion to wine had been intended 
and if shemahrim had been used in the sense of dregs or refuse, what would have 
hindered the use of the words mishta yayin al shemaraiv — ' a feast of wine upon his 
dregs ' ? Is it credible that the prophet wrote so obscurely for the sake of the allite- 
ration involved in mishta shemahnim and mishta shemahrim? It is true that the 
phrase shemareiha, 'the dregs thereof,' occurs in Psa. lxxv. 8, but the reference is 
to the insoluble parts of the mixture in the cup of the Divine wrath — the drugs 
mingled with the wine, and not to the dregs of the wine before drawn off from the 
vat. In Isa. li. 17, 22, where 'dregs' appears in the A. V., a different Hebrew 
word is employed. 

Of fat things full of marrow] Hebrew, shemahnim memukhaim, ' of fat- 
ness mar rowed out '= taken from the marrow-bone, provision exceedingly rich 
and abundant. 

Of wines on the lees well refined] Hebrew, shemahrim meztiqqaqim, ' of 
preserves well clarified.' 

The Lxx. indicates a different reading of the Hebrew text : — ' In this mountain 
they shall drink joyfulness (euphrosuneen) ; they shall drink wine {piontai oinori) ; 
they shall anoint themselves with ointment in this mountain; Aquila, poton 
lipasmaion diulismenon, ' a feast of fatnesses, (a feast) well clarified ' ; Symmachus, 
poton trugion diulismenon, ' a feast of lees, of things well clarified. ' The Syriac 
has 'a fat feast, a feast, I say, preserved and fat'; V., 'in this mountain a feast 
of fat things (conviviumpinguium), a feast of vintage-produce {convivium vindemia), 



1 68 ISAIAH, XXVII. 2, 3. 

a feast of marrowy things (convivium medullatorum) ; of vintage-produce well- 
cleansed (vindemice defcecatce).'' Dr Gill quotes a rendering by Fortunatus 
Seacchus : — " The Lord of hosts will make to all people a feast of ointments, a feast 
of those (animals) that are kept ; of ointments full of marrow; of those that are 
kept, pure " ; i. e. beasts well-kept and clean, according to the law of Moses.* 



Two festal luxuries supply the images presented in this verse : fat things, — rich, 
marrowy meats ; and confections, such as jellies and syrups : the former served up 
in their most savory form, the other in their purest state. These delicacies are, as 
they ever have been, the chief components of a sumptuous Eastern feast, and to- 
gether they strikingly represent the spiritual provision, full of strength and sweet- 
ness, made for the wants of our fallen race. God's spiritual gifts are not less plentiful 
and pleasant than His material bounties. Compare Psa. lxiii. 5, ' My soul shall 
be satisfied as with marrow and fatness ' / and Psa. cxix. 103, ' How sweet are 
thy words unto my taste ! yea, sweeter than honey to my mouth ! ' 



Chapter XXVII. Verses 2, 3. 
2 In that day sing ye unto her, A vineyard of red wine. 3 I the 
Lord do keep it ; I will water it every moment : lest any hurt it, I 
will keep it night and day. 

V. 2. A vineyard OF RED wine] Hebrew, kerem khemer, 'a vineyard of 
foaming juice.' [See Prel. Dis. on khemer, and Note on Deut. xxxii. 14.] Many 

* The A. V. rendering was retained by the Rev. Benjamin Parsons, author of ' Anti- Bacchus ' 
and ' The Wine Question Settled,' who remarks in the latter work (pp. 47-8) — " This passage 
receives a striking illustration from Pliny. Speaking of the tipplers of his time he says, ' That we 
may take the more wine, we break its strength by the filter.' His words are, Ut plus capiamus vini 
sacco frangimus vires. And again, UtUissimum vinum omnibus sacco viribus fractis ; ' the 
most useful wine is that which has had all its strength broken by the filter.' In the notes on 
the Delphin edition of Horace, Car. lib. xi. 6, it is said, Veteres nempe mustum priusquam 
ferbuisset per saccum toties colabunt ut defozcaretur, atque sic adempta quce vini vim. aliit, 
augetque, f&ce, liquidius, imbecillius, lenius, ac dulcius reddebant vinum, potuique jucundius : 
' The ancients filtered their wines repeatedly before they could have fermented, and thus the feces 
which nourish the strength of the wine being taken away, they rendered the wine itself more 
liquid, weaker, lighter, sweeter, and more pleasant to drink.' The fceces which were here taken 
away were no doubt the gluten which, though not_ known at that time by its scientific name, was 
the active principle of fermentation ; and Dr Ure, in his late 'Dictionary of the Arts,' on the word 
'Fermentation,' tells us that if the 'gluten or yeast' is removed by filtering, or by any other 
means caused to subside, fermentation will not take place. See, then, how exactly the words of the 
prophet and of these naturalists agree. Isaiah speaks of ' preserved wines well refined, ' or ' well 
filtered. ' Pliny tells us that wines were thus filtered to destroy their strength or spirit, and that 
the wines which had all their strength — not, mind ye, a part, but omnibus viribus, all their 
strength — broken by the filter, were the best wines. The Delphin commentator adds that this 
filtering took place before they could have fermented ; and Dr Ure informs us that when this is 
done grape-juice will not ferment. Hence, then, we learn that the shemarim, ' the wines on the 
lees,' or ' preserved wines well refined,' mentioned by Isaiah, were unfermented wines, were wines 
without any strength or spirit, and on that account were most esteemed in ancient days, and called 
the best and most useful wines. This harmless nutritious drink, therefore, is the beverage to which 
God compares the blessings of the gospel feast." 

The Rev. W. Ritchie, in his able essay entitled ' Scripture Testimony against Intoxicating Wine,' 
observes: — " On the whole we agree with those who regard this word (skemahrim) as meaning wine 
on the lees, old and pure wine. The lees are the refuse of the wine which lies at the bottom of the 
vessel, and preserves the wine in its freshness and flavor. [But there is no proof that the unfer- 
mented albumen ' preserves the wine,' or does any thing (until itself fermented) to the saccharine 
juice. — Eds.] The term thus becomes a brief name for the richest and best wines. But such 
wine needed to be strained ere it could be used, and hence the words added by the prophet, ' well 
refined,' Here, however, the whole tone of thought and expression forbids the idea of supposing the 
inspired penman to speak, in this promise, of intoxicating wine. We are led, on the contrary, to 
think of the rich, refreshing, unfermented juice of the grape — the pure wine which makes glad 
man's heart. This alone is a fit emblem of the heavenly blessings of salvation which are here prom- 
ised by God to our ruined world." 

Cranmer's Version (ed. 1585) reads:— "A feast of plenteous and delicate things, even of most 
pleasant anddaintie dishes." 



ISAIAH, XXVIII. I, 3. 169 

Hebrew MSS., however, have kef em khemed, 'a vineyard of delight ' = a delight- 
ful (or desirable) vineyard ; analogous to the shedai khemed of chap, xxxii. 12 — 
'the pleasant fields' of the A. V., and the marginal reading 'fields of desire.' 
The prophet Amos has this very expression (v. 11) — karmai khemed, 'vineyards of 
delight ' = pleasant vineyards. The distinction between the Hebrew letters "^ (d) 
and ^ (r) is so slight that a change of one for the other might easily be effected by 
a transcriber's error of sight or hand. Khemed is followed by the Lxx., ampelon 
kalos, *. a beautiful vineyard ' ; also by the Arabic ; and is supported by the 
Targum of Jonathan, 'a vineyard planted in good ground.' But the V., adopting 
khemer, has vinea meri, ' a vineyard of pure (wine) ' ; and the Syriac reads, ' of a 
vineyard of wine.' In this conflict of MSS. and versions no decision can be 
absolute. On the whole, probability favors khemeD ; but if khemed is preferred, 
the prophet prospectively describes the juice of the grape — then sweetening and 
ripening — as if already foaming under the treaders' feet, and yielding, when drunk 
in that state, before fermentation had set in, a nutritious and luscious beverage. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verses i, 3. 

1 Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose 
glorious beauty is a fading flower, which are on the head of the fat 
valleys of them that are overcome with wine ! . . . 3 The crown 
of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden under feet. 



V. 1, 3. Woe to the crown of pride] Hebrew, hoi atheth gauth 'lamenta- 
tion (is to) the crown of pride (or splendor).' The atereth is here the wreath of 
the reveller. Many commentators think that this image of the ' crown ' was sug- 
gested by the situation of Samaria, the capital city of the kingdom of the same name, 
encircled by a rich valley and chain of hills. 

V. 1. The drunkards of Ephraim] Hebrew, shikkorai Ephraim, 'the deep- 
drinkers of Ephraim.' The Lxx., taking the sh as s, sikkorai, reads, oi misthotoi, 
'the hirelings.' The Arabic follows in the wake; but Aquila, Symmachus, and 
Theodotion agree in giving methuontes, 'drunkards.' The Syriac has 'Ephraim 
the drunken ' ; the V., ebriis Ephraim, 'to the drunkards of Ephraim.' 

Them that are overcome with wine] Hebrew, halumai yayin, 'smit- 
ten of wine ' = whom wine has smitten. [Compare Prov. xxiii. 35 — hama- 
lumi, 'they have smitten me,' — showing that he who is smitten by wine is 
exposed to the smitings of every foe.] The margin of the A. V. has ' beaten with 
wine. ' The Lxx. has the strange reading, oi methuontes aneu oinou, ' those who 
are drunken without wine,' L e. with pride. So the Arabic. Aquila has oi katee- 
lasmenoi oino, ' those overthrown by wine ' ; Symmachus, oi peplaneemenoi hupo 
oinou, ' those wandering by wine ' ; Theodotion, oi katanenugmenoi oino, ' those 
stupefied by wine'; the V., errantes d vino, 'those wandering by wine.' The 
Syriac has 'made foolish' ; and the T., ' broken.' 



The tribe of Ephraim ( = fhe kingdom of Israel as distinguished from the 

kingdom of Judah), occupying as it did one of the finest situations in the Holy Land, 

might well be figuratively described as wearing ' a wreath of pride ' or beauty, ' a 

glorious ornament,' placed on ' the head of the fruitful valley ' ; but this ' wreath ' 

22 



170 ISAIAH, XXVIII. 7, 8. 

was merely a ' fading flower,' for it rested on the head of ' drunkards ' — of those 
who were 'smitten by wine,' and yet who kneeled down so abjectly to the smiter 
that they were about to be ' trodden under foot ' by a people more temperate and 
robust than themselves. Neither abundance of food, nor splendor of scenery, nor 
religious institutions, were able to preserve the Ephraimites from the effects of the 
dissoluteness which they courted by their use of the intoxicating yayin. The Jews 
had a tradition that the wine of Prugiatha and the waters {baths) of Diomasit cut 
off the ten tribes. Buxtorf interprets this of pleasures and delights — effeminacy of 
mind and body. A curious monument of their drunken habits survived in the 
* Sychar ' of John's Gospel. [See Note on John v. 7.] 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 7, 8. 

7 But they have also erred through wine, and through strong drink 
are out of the way ; the priest and the prophet have erred through 
strong drink, they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way 
through strong drink ; they err in vision, they stumble in judgment. 
8 For all tables are full of vomit a?id filthiness, so that there is no place 
clean. 



V. 7. But they also have erred through wine] Hebrew, ve-gam alleh bay- 
yayin shahgu, 'and also these by wine have wandered.' Shahgah, 'to wander,' 
'to go astray,' is the same word used in Prov. xx. I, and rendered in the A. V. 'is 
deceived.' Lxx., Codex B, has outoi gar oino pepleeimneleemenoi eisin, 'for these 
by wine have transgressed' \_pleemmeleo is literally to commit a fault in singing; 
hence to transgress in general]. But Codex A has peplanee??ienoi, 'have wan- 
dered.' V., verum hi quoque prcz vino nescierunt, 'truly these likewise by reason 
of wine have not known.' The Syriac has ' they have wandered on account of 
wine'; the Arabic, ' are lost in wine ' ; the T., 'have been drenched (inebriated) 
by wine. ' 

And through strong drink are out of the way] Hebrew, u-vash-shakar 
tahu, 'and by strong drink they stray' ; Lxx., eplaneetheesan dia to sikera, 'they 
have erred by means of the sicera ' / Syriac, they have wandered on account of 
sic era' ; Arabic, 'have erred by what is inebriating ' ; the T., 'by old wine have 
been stupefied ' ; V., et prce ebrietate erraverunt, ' and by reason of inebriety they 
have erred.' 

The priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink] Hebrew, 
kohan ve-nahvi shahgu vash-shakar, ' the priest and the prophet have wandered 
by strong drink ' ; Lxx., hiereus kai propheetees exesteesan dia to sikera, 'priest and 
prophet have become deranged [literally, 'put out of place'] by means of the 
sicera.'' Codex A reads, 'priest and prophet have been deranged by means of 
wine ; they have been deranged by means of sicera ' / Aquila, eegnoeesan, ' they 
have not known'; Symmachus, etarachtheesan, 'they have been confounded'; 
the V., sacerdos et propheta nescierunt prce ebriatate, 'the priest and prophet have 
not known by reason of inebriety ' ; the Syriac, ' priests and prophets have wan- 
dered on account of sicera '/ the T., ' the priest and the scribe have been drenched 
by old wine ' ; the Arabic, ' the priests as well as the prophets have been stupefied 
by reason of wine. ' 

They are swallowed up of wine] Hebrew, nivleu min hay-yayin ' they 



ISAIAH, XXVIII. 7, 8. 171 

have been swallowed down (devoured) from wine'; Lxx., katepotheesan dia ion 
oinon, ' they have been swallowed up by reason of the wine' ; the T., ' they have 
been cast down by wine'; the V., absorpti sunt d vino, 'they have been swal- 
lowed up by wine'; the Syriac, 'they have been overwhelmed by wine'; the 
Arabic, ' they have staggered by wine. ' 

They are out of the way through strong drink] Hebrew, tahu min 
hash-shakar, 'they have strayed from (by means of) strong drink'; Lxx., eseis- 
theesan apo tees methees, ' they have been shaken by strong drink ' ; Codex A has 
ton sikera, 'from sicera.' Aquila has apo tou methusmatos, 'from the inebriating 
drink ' ; the V., erraverunt in ebrietate, ' they have wandered with inebriety ' ; the 
T., ' they have wandered by old wine'; Theodotion, in tee methee eesdteutheesan 
hupeionkos, 'by strong drink they have been thoroughly debauched.' 

They err in vision, they stumble in judgment] Hebrew, shahgu baroeh, 
pahqu be-lilyiah, ' they have wandered in vision (roeh) ; they have staggered in 
judgment '= have failed to be upright in the exercise of their judicial functions. 
The V. has nescierunt videntetn, ignoraverunt judicium, ' they have not known one 
seeing (the seer), they have been ignorant of judgment.' Symmachus has dielusan 
krisin, 'they dissolved (= destroyed) judgment'; Lxx., Codex B, 'they have 
erred; this is a.phasma (apparition or sign) ' ; which Codex A lengthens into ' they 
have erred ; this is a phantasma (image, fantasy). ' The Syriac has ' they have 
eaten immoderately'; the T., 'they turned after sweet meat; their judges have 
wandered ' ; as if they had joined gluttony to inebriety. 



Verses 7 and 8 may be translated, "And these also have wandered through 
wine, and by means of strong drink have strayed ; the priest and the prophet have 
wandered by means of strong drink ; they have been swallowed down by wine ; 
they have strayed by means of strong drink; they have wandered in vision; they 
have staggered in judgment : for all (their) tables are full of vomit and filth ; not 
one place is clean." 

1. This statement is believed by most commentators to concern the people of 
Judah as distinguished, from the people of Israel (the ten tribes alluded to as 
Ephraim, ver. I, 2), and the verbs are supposed to be put in the past tense as a 
not unusual prophetic future. If so, the period spoken of must have been the dark 
and disastrous times which followed the transient glories of Hezekiah's reign. 

2. The physical effects of their indulgence in intoxicating liquors are strikingly 
made to portray their mental and moral influences. The irregular, wandering 
movements of the man who is in liquor — never able to preserve a straight line, and 
never going direct to any precise point — is emblematical of his erratic judgments 
and moral transgressions. He is ' swallowed down ' by wine, and goes not where 
his better nature, but where the vinous ' mocker,' may convey him. The language 
of the eighth verse, literal as it is, also admits of another application, for what is 
physically disgusting is typical of the filthiness of conceptions and utterance induced 
by inebriating drinks. ' No place is clean ' is the verdict which must be passed 
upon everything on which alcohol puts its mark. 

3. This picture crowns a series of prophetic declarations which conclusively 
negative the statement put forth by some writers and speakers, without any his- 
torical ground, that wine countries are sober countries, and that the insidious pro- 
gress of the lust for liquor is not to be dreaded in the native 'habitats of the 
vine. ' Neither a beautiful climate, nor sanitary and social laws, nor special teach- 



172 ISAIAH, XXIX. 9. 



ing, nor religious privileges, nor peculiar circumstances, were safeguards against the 
growth of the drunkard's appetite in all ranks. 

4. The prominence given to the 'priest' and 'the prophet' as the subjects of 
this unhallowed influence is specially appalling and instructive. The priest — who 
was the people's representative with God, — and the prophet — who was God's repre- 
sentative with the people, — men who should have stood out as exemplars of purity 
and as reprovers of the guilty, were among the most depraved ! As one conse- 
quence of their sin they 'wandered in vision,' not being able to fix their minds 
upon the divine law so as to discern it either rationally or spiritually, and (as it has 
been suggested) mistaking for divine revelations the fancies, dreams, and visions 
of their own distempered brains. So affected, it was unavoidable that they should 
' stagger in judgment ' — tottering and stumbling in the discharge of those duties 
which, above all others, required the utmost clearness, serenity, and collectedness 
of mind. By this use of wine and strong drink the priests, who were pledged to 
abstinence while engaged in the ' divine service ' (Lev. x. 9), were guilty of 
sacrilege as well as of the particular sin committed; and the prophets, who are 
thought to have been trained as Nazarites, if not expressly bound by the vow, were 
gross backsliders from their early temperance. They, like the less privileged 
classes, had 'altogether become unclean.' 



Chapter XXVIII. Verses 9, 10. 

9 Whom shall he teach knowledge ? and whom shall he make to 
understand doctrine ? them that are weaned from the milk, and drawn 
from the breasts. 10 For precept must be upon precept, precept upon 
precept; line upon line, line upon line; here a little, and there a 
little. 



Ver. 9 is generally accepted as the reply of the drunken priests and prophets 
of Judah, in which they, with the characteristic self-sufficiency of tipplers, 
boast their competency for their work, — ' Whom shall he teach knowledge ? ' 
Ver. 10 — a continuation of their reply — is also regarded as an ironical imitation of 
the disconnected mumbling of the tippler, — Ki-tzav-lahizahv — tzav-lahtzahv — 
qav-lahqahv — qav-lahqahv — zeair-shahm — zeair-shahm, 'for precept to p7'ecept — 
precept to precept — line to line — line to line — here a little — there a little? They thus 
complain that they are treated as children requiring elementary instruction ; and Dr 
Henderson, in his Commentary, remarks, "The words are often preposterously 
quoted in application to the abundant possession of religious privileges ! Both this 
verse and ver. 13 convey the idea of paucity, or a mere outline of instruction, and 
not that of fulness." 

In ver. II the prophet resumes his predictions, and threatens these insensate 
drunkards that, since they will not hear their Divine King when He speaks to them 
persuasively, they shall be made to hear Him when He speaks through a people 
of 'barbarous language,' who will come to chastise them for their sins. 



Chapter XXIX. Verse 9. 

Stay yourselves, and wonder ; cry ye out, and cry : they are drunken, 
but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink. 



ISAIAH, XXXIV. 4, 5, 7. 173 

They are drunken, but not with wine] Hebrew, shahkeru ve-la yayin 
'they have been drunken, and (there was) not wine ' =wine was not present. 

They stagger, but not with strong drink] Hebrew, nahu ve-lo shakar, 
'they have staggered ( = moved to and fro), and (there was) not strong drink.' 

The Lxx., eklutheete kai eksteete kraipaleesate ouk apo sikera oude apo oinou t 
' be ye overcome, and stupefied, be ye sick (as after a debauch), not by sicera nor 
by wine'; V., inebriamini et non a vino, movemini et non ab ebrietate, 'be ye 
inebriated and not with wine, be ye disturbed and not by inebriety.' 



The people of Jerusalem should be as besotted as those who had filled themselves 
with intoxicating yayin, and as unsteady and helpless in their actions as those who 
had plied themselves with intoxicating shakar. 



Chapter XXX. Verse 24. 
The oxen likewise and the young asses that ear the ground shall 
eat clean provender, which hath been winnowed with the shovel and 
with the fan. 



Clean provender] Hebrew, belil khahmitz, 'mixed food, salted.' The deri- 
vation of khahmitz from khahmatz implies such a pungency in the provender as salt 
would supply. 

Chapter XXXII. Verse 10. 
Many days and years shall ye be troubled, ye careless women : for 
the vintage shall fail, the gathering shall not come. 



The vintage SHALL fail] Hebrew, kahlah vahtzir, 'the cutting (of grapes) 
shall fail.' 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 12. 
They shall lament for the teats, for the pleasant fields, for the 
fruitful vine. 



For the pleasant fields] Hebrew, al sedai-khemed, ' for the fields of delight ' 
= the delightful fields. [See Note on chap, xxvii. 2, 3.] 

For the fruitful vine] Hebrew, al gephen poriyah, ' for (on account of) the 
prolific vine.' 

Chapter XXXIV. Verse 4. 
And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens 
shall be rolled together as a scroll : and all their host shall fall down, as 
the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig tree. 

From the vine] Hebrew, mig-gephen. 



Chapter XXXIV. Verses 5, 7. 
s For my sword shall be bathed in heaven : behold, it shall come 
down upon Idumea, and upon the people of my curse, to judgment. 



1/4 ISAIAH, XLI. 17, 18. 

. . . 7 And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bul- 
locks with the bulls ; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and 
their dust made fat with fatness. 



V. 5. For my sword shall be bathed in heaven] The Hebrew for bathed 
is rivthak, 'steeped,' 'drenched' ; Lxx., emethusthee ; V., inebriatus est. 

V. 7. Their land shall be soaked with blood] The margin of A. V. gives 
' drunken ' ; but the Hebrew is the same as in ver. 5 above, rivthah, rendered 
'bathed'; Lxx., methustheesetai ; V., inebriatur. 



Chapter XXXVI. Verses 16, 17. 

16 Hearken not to Hezekiah: for thus saith the king of Assyria, 
Make an agreement with me by a present, and come out to me : and 
eat ye every one of his vine, and every one of his fig tree, and drink 
ye every one the waters of his own cistern ; 17 Until I come and take 
you away to a land like your own land, a land of corn and wine, a 
land of bread and vineyards. 



V. 17. Wine] Hebrew, tirosh, 'vine-fruit.' 

Bread] Hebrew, lekhem, ' bread ' = all food made of corn. 



[See Note on 2 Kings xviii. 31, 32, where the same words occur.] 



Chapter XXXVII. Verse 30. 

And this shall be a sign unto thee, Ye shall eat this year such as 
groweth of itself; and the second year that which springeth of the 
same : and in the third year sow ye, and reap, and plant vineyards, 
and eat the fruit thereof. 

And plant vineyards] Hebrew, ve-nitu kerahmim, 'and plant vineyards.' 



Chapter XLI. Verses 17, 18. 

17 When the poor and needy seek water, and there is none, and 
their tongue faileth for thirst, I the Lord will hear them, I the God 
of Israel will not forsake them. 18 1 will open rivers in high places, 
and fountains in the midst of the valleys : I will make the wilderness 
a pool of water, and the dry land springs of water. 



No imagery could be more forcibly descriptive of suffering than that of thirst, 
when water could not be procured, and when the tongue (z. e. power of speech) 
had failed for want of moisture ; and, on the other hand, no imagery could more 
fitly set forth the fulness and blessedness of an escape from this trouble than the 
promise that streams should flow from high places, fountains burst forth in the 
valleys and the wilderness, and an arid soil abound with pools and springs. 



ISAIAH, XLIV. 12. 175 



Chapter XLIII. Verse 20. 
The beast of the field shall honor me, the dragons and the owls : 
because I give waters in the wilderness, and rivers in the desert, to 
give drink to my people, my chosen. 



For ancient Israel God provided water out of the flinty rock, which followed 
them during their desert journeying; but, under the figure of a still more abundant 
supply of the vital fluid, He promises a triumphant deliverance for His people, 
conditional, however, upon their repentance and fidelity. 



Chapter XLIII. Verse 24. 
Thou hast bought me no sweet cane with money, neither hast 
thou filled me with the fat of thy sacrifices : but thou hast made me 
to serve with thy sins, thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities. 



Hast thou filled me] Hebrew, hirvithahni, 'hast thou filled me to the 
full.' The margin of A. V. gives 'made me drunk, or abundantly moistened me.' 
The verb is rahvah, so often before noticed. Lxx., epethumeesa, 'have I desired'; 
V., inebriasti me, the use of which in reference to the 'fat of sacrifice' shows that 
inebrio, like rahvak and shahkar, had radically a reference to filling-to-the-full, 
and not to any intoxicating effect of the article consumed. 



Chapter XLIV. Verse 12. 
The smith with the tongs both worketh in the coals, and fashioneth 
it with hammers, and worketh it with the strength of his arms : yea, 
he is hungry, and his strength faileth : he drinketh no water, and is 
faint. 



The ancient hammersmith, when he drank no water, was faint. It is also 
implied that to water he looked for the liquid refreshment of which he stood in 
need. In our own country, before the introduction of Temperance societies, some 
of the hardest work in foundries was performed without fermented liquors, and 
continues to be so executed at this day, even where the workmen are not at other 
times abstainers. The mingling of oatmeal with the water is not less useful in the 
case of man than of the horse.* It would be worth untold millions to the laboring 
classes — to say nothing of many other advantages transcending all pecuniary 

*The Times newspaper, in a graphic account (Sept., 1867) of the rolling of a fifteen-inch armor- 
plate at the Atlas Works, Sheffield, gave a powerful testimony to the superiority of abstinence : — 
" Sometimes we came on groups of men who were saturating in water the rough bands of sacking 
in which they were enveloped before going to wrestle with some white-heat forging : sometimes on 
men, nearly naked, with the perspiration pouring from them, who had come to rest for a moment 
from the puddling furnaces, and to take a long drink of the thick oatmeal and water, which is all 
that they venture on during their labor, and which long experience has proved to be the most 
sustaining of all drinks under the tremendous heat to which they were subjected." One of the 
workmen writing to the Alliance News in reference to this paragraph (Oct. 12, 1867) observed, — 
" Very many of the workmen at the Atlas Works are total abstainers, and at the Cyclops (where 
an armor-plate of fourteen inches in thickness was rolled more than two years ago, and where 
plates from four to nine inches in thickness, and of the finest quality, are occasionally rolled) the 
teetotalers are nearly man for man with the drinkers, the chief roller and furnaceman being 
teetotalers, one of fourteen and the other of eight years' standing." Be it observed that during 
the actual manipulation of these iron plates, all the workmen find abstinence essential to vigor 
and endurance. 



176 ISAIAH, LI. 17. 



estimate — were they to cast off their superstitious faith in the power of alcoholic 
liquors to assist them in their daily toil. Beer is still the fetich of the ' freeborn 
Englishman ' as it was in the days of De Foe, who satirizes the slavish worship in 
some well-known lines. 



Chapter XLIX. Verse 26. 

And I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh ; and 
they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet wine : and 
all flesh shall know that I the Lord am thy Saviour and thy Re- 
deemer, the mighty One of Jacob. 



And they shall be drunken with their own blood, as with sweet 
wine] The Hebrew, ve-ke-ahsis dahmam yishkahrun, ' and like fresh grape-juice 
their own blood they-shall-drink-to-the-full,' i. e. by a strong figure, they shall 
drink as plentifully of their own blood as they have been accustomed to drink of 
the fresh-trodden juice of the grape. [As to Ahsis, see Prel. Dis.] The clear 
meaning ofshah-kar here is simply that of drinking largely, without any intoxication 
implied ; and shah-kar, instead of rahvah, is used because ahsis connects the idea 
of sweetness with the draught. The Lxx., kai piontai hos oinon neon to haima 
auton, kai methutheesontai, ' and they shall drink — as (if it were) new wine — their 
own blood, and shall be filled full ' ; V., et quasi musto sanguine suo inebriabuntur, 
* and as with must (fresh grape-juice), with their own blood they shall be inebriated 
(filled to the full).' The T. has 'and as they are satiated with pure wine (inak- 
hamar marith), so the beasts of the field shall be satiated with their blood.' 



Chapter LI. Verse 17. 

Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the 
hand of the Lord the cup of his fury ; thou hast drunken the dregs 
of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out. 



The cup of his fury] Hebrew, eth kos khamahtho, 'the cup of his heat 
(fury).' [As to Khamath, see Prel. Dis., and Notes on Deut. xxxii. 24; Job 
xxi. 20; Psa. lviii. 5 ; Hos. vii. 5.] 

The dregs of the CUP OF trembling] Hebrew, eth-qubaath kos hataralah, 
'the lowest contents of the cup of reeling.' Under qubadth, in allusion to this 
verse, Gesenius writes, "'The chalice of the cup.' Abulwalid understands the 
froth and dregs of the cup (from the idea of covering), but the explanation already 
given is the better. What is probably meant by qubadth kos is ' the whole cup, 
even to the bottom.' " Henderson renders qubadth by 'goblet,' and kos hatara- 
lah by 'cup of intoxication.' This is the 'cup of trembling,' or 'reeling.' 
Symmachus has ton krateera tou sparagmou, 'the cup of convulsion,' or agony. 
[See Note on Psa. xlix. 5, where the A. V. renders hataralah by 'astonishment.'] 

And wrung them out] Hebrew, matzith, 'thou hast sucked up ( = drained it),' 
— from matzah, 'to suck up.' 

The Lxx. gives to poteerion tou thumou autou, to poteerion tees ptoseos, to kondu 
tou thumou exepies kai exekenosas, 'the cup of his anger, the cup of falling, 



ISAIAH, LV. I, 2. 177 



( = destruction,) the drinking-cup of (his) anger thou hast drunk up and hast 
emptied out'; the V., bibisti calicem irce ejus ; usque ad fundum calicis soporis 
bibisti, et potdsti usque ad fceces, ' thou has drunk the cup of his wrath ; even to 
the bottom of the cup of stupor thou hast drunk, and thou hast drunk even to the 
dregs.' 



Chapter LI. Verse 21. 
Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with 
wine. 



And drunken, but not with wine] Hebrew, ushekuratk ve-lo miy-yayin t 
' and (thou) drunken, and not from wine ' ; Lxx. kai methuousa ouk apo oinou ; 
V. et ebria non d vino, 'and drunken, not from wine.' 



Chapter LI. Verse 22. 
Thus saith thy Lord the Lord, and thy God that pleadeth the 
cause of his people, Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup 
of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no 
more drink it again. 



|~As to 'cup of trembling,' etc., see Notes on ver. 17.] 



Chapter LV. Verse i. 
Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that 
hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and 
milk without money and without price. 



Wine and milk] Hebrew, yayin ve-khahlav, 'wine and milk.' The latter 
word, pointed as kkelev, would designate 'fatness,' which some interpreters regard 
as the true sense ; in which case yayin would represent all sweet drinks, and 
khelev all nutritious food. Lxx., phagete oinou kai stear, 'eat wine and fat- 
ness ' ; V., emite vinum et lac, ' buy wine and milk.' If khahlahv is retained, and 
rendered 'milk,' it is not impossible that yayin may be used in the general sense 
of grapes, and all that they yield, as affording the solid food, to ' eat ' which the 
invitation is extended. 

Chapter LV. Verse 2. 
Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and 
your labor for that which satisfieth not ? hearken diligently unto me, 
and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in 
fatness. 



The inquiries of this verse are susceptible of an important application to material 
as well as spiritual objects. They are specially pertinent to those who waste their 
means, often the scanty reward of toilsome labor, upon intoxicating beverages 
which 'satisfy not.' Their wisdom, and that of all men, is to renounce such 
drinks, purchasing and eating in preference that 'which is good,' and delighting in 
the ' fatness ' of which they now deprive themselves by their expenditure upon 
inebriating liquors. 

23 



178 ISAIAH, LX. 7. 



Chapter LV. Verse 10. 
For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and 
returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring 
forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the 
eater. 



But watereth the earth] Hebrew, im hirvah eth hah-ahretz, 'but saturates 
the earth.' Hirvah is the Hipbil conjugation of rahvah. 



Chapter LVI. Verse 12. 
Come ye, say they, I will fetch wine, and we will fill ourselves with 
strong drink; and to-morrow shall be as this day, and much more 
abundant. 



I WILL FETCH wine] Hebrew, eqkhah yayin, 'I will fetch wine.' 
And we well fill ourselves with strong drink] Hebrew, ve-nisbeah 
shakar, 'and we will suck up strong drink.' Nisbeah is from sah-bah, 'to suck,' 
'to tope.' [See Prel. Dis., and Notes on Deut. xxi. 20; Prov. xxiii. 20, 21 ; Isa. 
i. 22; Hos. iv. 18; Nah. i. 10.] This verse is absent from the Lxx., but it is 
given by Theodotion, who for wine has oinon, and for strong drink, metheen. 
The V. has sumamus vinum et impleamur ebrietate, ' let us take wine and be filled 
with drunkenness.' 



This language is the quintessence of sensuality, though, as with many ancient 
tipplers, it was the quantity rather than the spirituous strength of their liquor 
which was principally regarded. The concluding clause, which literally reads, 
'and as to-day, so to-morrow shall be, great, exceedingly, abundantly,' expresses 
the exuberant delight experienced in the prospect of continued indulgence — a per- 
petual revelry. 



Chapter LVIII. Verse ii. 
And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul 
in drought, and make fat thy bones : and thou shalt be like a watered 
garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not. 



Like A watered garden] Hebrew, ke-gan raveh, 'like a garden drenched'; 
Lxx. hos keepos methuon, ' as a saturated garden ' ; V., quasi hortus itigatus, ' as 
an irrigated garden.' 

Chapter LX. Verse 7. 
All the flocks of Kedar shall be gathered together unto thee, the 
rams of Nebaioth shall minister unto thee: they shall come up with 
acceptance on mine altar, and I will glorify the house of my glory. 



The rams of Nebaioth] Hebrew, ailai Nevaioth. The Nabathsea, or Na- 
bathaeans, who are supposed to have been descended from Nebajoth, the firstborn 
of Ishmael (Gen. xxv. 13), inhabited the central part of Arabia. Their wealth was 
pastoral, though some branches of the tribe were addicted to commerce. In his 



ISAIAH, LXII. 8, 9. 179 



description of them Diodorus Siculus (b. C. 60) notices some peculiarities in which 
they very closely resemble the Rechabites. The words of the Sicilian geographer 
are, ' It is a law (nomos) among them not to sow corn, nor to plant, nor to use 
wine (meete oino chreesthai), nor to build a house ' (xix. c. 94). See Notes on Jer. 



Chapter LXI. Verse 5. 

And strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the 
alien shall be your plowmen and your vinedressers. 



And your vinedressers] Hebrew, ve-kormaikem, ' and your vineyards ' = 
vinedressers. 

Chapter LXII. Verses 8, 9. 

8 The Lord hath sworn by his right hand, and by the arm of his 
strength, Surely I will no more give thy corn to be meat for thine 
enemies ; and the sons of the stranger shall not drink thy wine, for 
the which thou hast labored : 9 But they that have gathered it shall 
eat it, and praise the Lord ; and they that have brought it together 
shall drink it in the courts of my holiness. 



V. 8. Shall not drink thy wine] Hebrew, ve-im-yishtu tiroshak, * and shall 
not drink thy vine-fruit '; Lxx., kai ei eti piontai hyoi allotrioi ton oinon sou, 'and 
if longer the foreign children shall drink thy wine ' ; V., et si biberint filii alieni 
vinum tuum, 'and if the foreign children should drink thy wine.' 



Though tirosh occurs thirty-eight times in the Old Testament, this is the only 
passage where it is connected with the act of drinking. The real character of 
tirosh as ' vine-fruit ' is too firmly established by an induction of texts to permit 
the affixing of another meaning to it, on the strength of this single verse. If we 
were constrained to view the construction, as an exception to the rule, it would 
remain an exception, certainly not invalidating, if it did not confirm, the rule. 
But there is no reason for regarding the collocation of this passage as at all incon- 
sistent with the fact that tirosh denoted a solid and not a liquid substance. That 
the prophet speaks of it as if it were a liquid is explicable by supposing that he 
speaks figuratively, or elliptically. 

1. To put one thing for another, especially when the objects are closely allied, 
is a figure of speech common alike to poetry and prose. In this very verse ' corn ' 
(dahgan), which is said to be eaten, is used for bread {lekheni) made from the flour 
of corn ; and so ' to drink the tirosh ' is an easy and parallel figure, signifying drink- 
ing the yayin which the tirosh would yield after pressure. 

2. Elliptical modes of expression are universal, and give rise to phraseology that 
is apparently figurative. Thus to ' send a cut of meat ' is to send a piece cut from 
another j to ' make up a purse ' is to make up a sum of money to be put into a 
purse for presentation ; to ' drink a bottle,' or a ' cup,' is to drink what the vessels 
contain. The last examples are strictly analogous to the phrase 'to drink tirosh,'' 
meaning to drink the juice held in its grapes as in bottles, and so held as to be free 
from every contaminating and deteriorating influence. 



180 ISAIAH, LXIII. I, 2 3, 6. 

And they that have brought it together shall drink it] Hebrew, 
ttmqabtzahv yishttihu, ' and those collecting it shall drink it.' The meaning of 
qah-botz is 'to collect,' 'to gather,' and inferentially marks the solid nature of the 
substance gathered — the tirosh which by figure or ellipsis is said to be drunk. This 
is admitted by Gesenius, who, though in most other places regarding tirosh as 
'new wine,' explains qah-botz by a reference to this passage as signifying 'to collect 
things, as grapes. y 



Chapter LXIII. Verse i. 
Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from 
Bozrah ? this that is glorious in his apparel, traveling in the great- 
ness of his strength ? I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. 



With dyed garments] Hebrew, khamutz be-gahdim, 'bright with garments.' 
The use of kha77iutz in this connection is to be referred to a law of language by which 
words descriptive of effects upon one sense are applied to effects upon another. 
Thus we speak of ' a sweet flower,' ' a beautiful song,' ' a well-toned picture.' The 
most remarkable example, perhaps, is that of the blind man who, asked what 
were his conceptions of scarlet, answered that he supposed it was like the sound of 
a trumpet — i. e. vivid and thrilling in its effects. So the effect of fermentation in 
giving to sweet liquors a pungent taste (whether alcoholic or acid) is employed in 
this passage to depict the vivid impression made upon the eye by a hero arrayed 
in dyed garments, probably of a crimson or purple color. 



Chapter LXIII. Verses 2, 3, 6. 

2 Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel, and thy garments like 
him that treadeth in the winefat ? 3 1 have trodden the winepress 
alone ; and of the people there was none with me : for I will tread 
them in mine anger, and trample them in my fury ; and their blood 
shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my 
raiment. . . . 6 And I will tread down the people in mine 
anger, and make them drunk in my fury, and I will bring down 
their strength to the earth. 

V. 2. Red in thine apparel] Hebrew, ahdom lilvushekah, ' red as to thy 
apparel.' This redness is compared to the color of 'blood' in ver. 3. The 
garments of the hero are represented as red with blood, and thus resembling those 
who trod in the wine-press. This comparison intimates the abundance of grapes 
yielding a bright red juice. On this point we present below an instructive extract.* 



* "The grape cultivated in the open air in this country has, for the most part, a husk of a dusky 
yellowish green, and juice colorless or of a cloudy white ; and though the purple-husked grape is 
also met with, the juice of that is either colorless, or very slightly tinged with a pale yellowish 
hue, little differing from what is generally termed white. Only one instance of a red or purple- 
juiced grape grown in the open air in Great Britain is known to the writer. Even in hothouses it 
is seldom that a red-juiced grape can be met with, though red or black-husked grapes are common 
enough. The celebrated Speechly, who was gardener to the Duke of Portland, and raised at 
Welbeck Abbey the immense cluster of Syrian grapes mentioned in a former part of this treatise 
[see page 46 of this work], says, in his work on the vine, that the juice of the claret grape is of a 
red blood color, a statement the correctness of which has been confirmed to the author by several 



ISAIAH, LXV. 8. l8l 



In the winefat] Hebrew, be-gath, 'in the press ' (gath is referred to ganan, 
'to pound,' 'to press'); Lxx., leenou ; V., in torculari. 

V. 3. The winepress] Hebrew, purah, 'press.' This word occurs only 
here and in Hag. ii. 16. It is derived from pur, ' to break ' ; hence purah is the 
place where the grapes were crushed by the treaders. The V. has iorcular ; the 
Lxx. gives no equivalent ; Symmachus has leenon. 

V. 6. And I will make them drunk] Hebrew, va-ashakr&m, ' and I have 
intoxicated them.' The generic sense of shahkar, 'to satiate,' 'fill to the full,' is 
here applied to intoxication, as the succeeding phrase intimates. 

With my anger] Hebrew, vakhamathi, ' with my heat (fury). ' Here kha-math 
is rendered in A. V. ' anger ' ; but in ver. 5, vakhamathi, it is translated ' and 
my fury.' The radical sense of 'heat' naturally gave rise to the derivative senses 
of inflammatory 'poison,' and figuratively of 'anger,' 'indignation.' The Lxx. is 
without this clause, but Symmachus and Theodotion possess it, — kai emethusa 
autous en thumo mou, 'and I have made them drunk with my wrath.' V., et 
inebriavi eos in indignatione mea. Dr Henderson prefers the reading, ' I brake 
them in pieces,' instead of ' I have made them drunk.' 



The Divine Ruler is represented as filling His enemies with His khamath, which 
has upon them the effect of a poisonous potion; and as intoxication can never 
really impart vigor to those who are the subjects of it, it is strikingly added, 
i And I will bring down their strength to the earth.'' That which inebriates neces- 
sarily enervates, and the degree of enervation (other things being equal) is always 
proportional to the quantity consumed in a given time. Strong drink is only 
strong to weaken both body and mind — a lesson which the world has yet to com- 
prehend and act upon. Most instructive is it to observe that when God would 
present a symbol of His retributive wrath He selects for this purpose an intoxi- 
cating draught, which ' brings down the strength ' of His adversaries ' to the earth. ' 



Chapter LXV. Verse 8. 
Thus saith the Lord, As the new wine is found in the cluster, and 
one saith, Destroy it not; for a blessing is in it: so will I do for my 
servants' sakes, that I may not destroy them all. 



As the new wine IS FOUND in the cluster] Hebrew, ka-asher yimmahtza, 
hat-tirosh bah-eshkol, ' like as the vine-fruit is in a cluster (or on a vine-stalk) ' ; 
Lxx., hos tropon euretJieesetai ho rhox en to botrui, 'as the grape-stone shall be 

intelligent horticulturists, one of whom observes that it is a little black grape, harsh and disagree- 
able to eat. It is a French grape, though cultivated elsewhere, as in Italy, under the name of 
'claretto rosso di Francia,' being used for the purpose of mixing with other wines to give them 
color. There is also a Spanish grape, called 'tinto,' which is described as of exquisite flavor 
and unrivaled sweetness, having a rich crimson juice, almost like blood ; and from it, the author 
is informed, the sweet wine called 'tent,' frequently used for sacramental purposes, is made. 
There can be little doubt that such grapes were well known in Judea in former times, and those 
who were familiar with it would at once perceive the full force and propriety of the term ' blood of 
the grape,' and the comparison between wine made of that particular grape and blood. In the 
Apocrypha (1 Mace. vi. 34) a singular circumstance is mentioned of an artifice resorted to for 
provoking the war elephants: 'And to the end that they might provoke the elephants to fight, 
they showed them the blood of grapes and mulberries.' The juiceof these grapes must evidently 
have been red, or it could not have deceived so sagacious an animal. Achilles Tatius, a Greek 
author (A. d. 300), in his second book, relates that Bacchus, once being entertained by a Tyrian 
shepherd, gave him some wine to drink. The shepherd, after he had tasted it, asked Bacchus, 
* Where did you procure blood so sweet ?' Bacchus answered him, ' This is the blood of the 
grape.' "—Tiroshlo Yayin, pp. 67-8. (1841.) 



1 82 ISAIAH, LXV. II, 20. 

found in the cluster'; V., quomodo si inveniatur granum in botro, 'as if a grain 
(the young grape) should be found in a cluster.' The Hebrew expression is 
peculiar, and apparently implies a paucity of produce, the entire fruit on a vine 
being represented by a single cluster instead of by many clusters of grapes. 

And one saith, Destroy it not; for a blessing is in it] 'And he (one) 
says, Thou wilt not destroy it, for a blessing (is) with it.' By verahkah, 'bless- 
ing,' may be understood God's benediction on the tirosh as one of His good 
creatures, or the nature of tirosh, which was adapted to prove a blessing to the 
people when fully developed and properly used. Codex A of the Lxx. has ' a 
blessing of the Lord is in it.' Both meanings may be said to coincide, since that 
which God blesses will assuredly (unless perverted by man's misdirected ingenuity 
and misapplied power) bless those on whom it is bestowed. 



Under the figure of a single cluster of vine-fruit which is all that exists to reward 
the toil and expectations of the proprietor, and yet which will not be destroyed 
because a blessing is with it, the God of Israel promises that, on account of His 
servants' sakes, few as those servants are, He will not destroy all the Jewish people, 
but (ver. 9) will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, etc. The single cluster is good 
and valuable as such, and therefore not to be destroyed. Let it not be forgotten 
that by the process of converting the fruit of the vine and of the field into intoxi- 
cating drinks, not only is their virtue as food effectually destroyed, but the new 
product springing from this destruction becomes a destroyer of mankind beyond 
all that can be affirmed of sword, fire, and plague. 



Chapter LXV. Verse ii. 

But ye are they that forsake the Lord, that forget my holy moun- 
tain, that prepare a table for that troop, and that furnish the drink- 
offering unto that number. 

The drink-offering unto that number] Hebrew, lameni mimsahk, ' and 
to Fortune a mixture' ; Lxx., kai pleeronntes tee tuchee kerasma, 'and filling to 
Fortune a mixture'; V., et libatis super earn (Fortunam), 'and ye have made 
libations over her (Fortune).' Meni was probably the name of some goddess 
worshiped by the idolatrous Jews, to whom a mixture {mimsahk), composed of 
wiae and other ingredients, was offered in sacrifice. 



Chapter LXV. Verse 20. 



There shall be no more thence an infant of days, nor an old man 
that hath not filled his days : for the child shall die an hundred years 
old ; but the sinner being an hundred years old shall be accursed. 



The meaning evidently is that a time shall come when the term of childhood 
shall be extended, because the age of manhood is prolonged ; when the man who 
falls short of an hundred years shall be judged to have cut short his days by some 
kind of intemperance, — he shall be reckoned 'as accursed.' This possibility is 
not only a doctrine of the Bible, but of science, as the following citations will 
prove : — 



ISAIAH, LXV. 21. 183 



" By me (Wisdom) thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life shall 
be increased" (Prov. ix. 10, 11). 

"There is good ground for believing," says the Census Report for 1851, " that 
life may gradually be raised yet nearer to the complete natural life-time. The 
way is not closed to great and immediate ameliorations ; but as it has pleased the 
Author of the universe to make the food of mankind chiefly the product of labor, 
their clothing of skill, their intellectual enjoyments of education, their purest emo- 
tions of art, so health and the natural life-time of the race are, in a certain sense, 
evidently to be the creation of the intellect and the will ; and it is only with the ob- 
servation, experience, science, foresight, prudence and decisions of generations of 
men at command, that the battle of life can be fought out victoriously to the end." 

The realization of this ideal standard of longevity to any general extent must, 
however, be indefinitely postponed until the personal and hereditary effects of 
alcoholic indulgence are unknown — a social condition which never can be reason- 
ably expected until the use of intoxicating liquor as a beverage is abandoned, and 
its pernicious sale prevented. The great majority of long livers have been either 
abstainers from intoxicating drinks or users of them to a very limited degree. 
Aged topers are rarce aves, and as no one professes to believe in the physical 
harmlessness of deep drinking, it must be conceded that their term of years would 
have been extended by abstemious habits. A striking confirmation of this action 
of alcohol in abridging even a very protracted life was furnished in the case of Dr 
Holyoke, of Salem, Massachusetts, who lived to a hundred years, but whose personal 
friend (Dr Pierson) and biographer deponed before a select committee of the Massa- 
chusetts legislature, that though Dr H. was 'never tempted to excess,' and drank 
intoxicating liquors in small quantities only, yet he "died of the disease most 
commonly produced by the use of ardent spirits and tobacco, an internal cancer." 
All the other viscera except the stomach were in a healthy state. Dr Pierson added, 
"lam far from wishing to say any thing to the discredit of the late Dr Holyoke, 
who was my personal friend, but if his great age is to be made an argument for 
the moderate use of spirits, I desire that his scirrhous stomach should be put 
alongside of it." [See the testimony of Josephus to the longevity of the Essenes, 
quoted in this Commentary.] 



Chapter LXV. Verse 21. 



And they shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall 
plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them. 



And they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them] 
Hebrew, ve-natu keramim ve-ahklu piryam, 'and they have planted vineyards, and 
have eaten their fruit ' (the past form to be taken as the prophetic future) ; Lxx., 
kai kataphuteusousin ampelonas kai autoi phagontai ta genneemata auton; so the V., 
et plantabunt vineas et comedent fructus earum, ' and they shall plant vineyards 
and shall eat their fruits.' 



This prediction indicates the extensive use made of the fruit of the vine for pur- 
poses of diet, the most useful appropriation of the grape, as of all other fruits. 
[See Note on 2 Kings xviii. 31.] 



THE BOOK OF JEREMIAH. 

[Jeremiah flourished about the year 600 b. c] 



Chapter II. Verse 21. 



Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed : how then 
art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me ? 



A noble vine] Hebrew, sorak, 'a sorak (superior) vine.' [See Notes on Gen. 
xlix. 11, and Isa. v. 2.] Lxx., ampelon karpophoron, 'a fruit-bearing vine.' 

The degenerate plant of a strange vine] Litterally, 'the degenerate 
branches of the foreign vine.' 



Chapter V. Verse 17. 

And they shall eat up thine harvest, and thy bread, which thy sons 
and thy daughters should eat: they shall eat up thy flocks and 
thine herds : they shall eat up thy vines and thy fig trees : they shall 
impoverish thy fenced cities, wherein thou trustedst, with the sword. 



They shall eat up thy vines and thy fig trees] Hebrew, yokal gaphnekah 
u-tcanahtheka, ' they shall eat thy vines and thy fig trees,' — teanah (fig tree), 
teanim (fig trees). 



Chapter VI. Verse i. 
O ye children of Benjamin, gather yourselves to flee out of the 
midst of Jerusalem, and blow the trumpet in Tekoa, and set up a sign 
of fire in Beth-haccerem : for evil appeareth out of the north, and great 
destruction. 



In Beth-haccerem] Hebrew, al-baith hakkerem, 'in Beth-haccerem,' i. e. 'in a 
house of the vineyards ' — the name of a town situated between Jerusalem and 
Tekoa. [See Note on Neh. iii. 4.] 



Chapter VI. Verse 9. 
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, They shall thoroughly glean the 
remnant of Israel as a vine: turn back thine hand as a grape- 
gatherer into the baskets. 



JEREMIAH, XIII. 12, 13. 1 85 

They shall thoroughly glean ... as a vine] Hebrew, olal yeolelu 
kag-gephen, '(as one) gleaning, they shall glean as a vine (is gleaned).' 

Turn back thine hand as a grapegatherer into the baskets] Hebrew, 
hosav yahdkah ke-votzar al ' salsilloth. The grapegatherer {botzar), i. e. he who cut 
off the grapes from the vine, was constantly withdrawing his hand from the vine 
to the basket where the grapes were to be placed; and this action is used by 
Jeremiah to describe the frequency with which the invader would return to strip 
Judah of its people and its possessions. 



Chapter VII. Verse 18. 
The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the 
women knead their dough, to make cakes to the queen of heaven, 
and to pour out drink-offerings unto other gods, that they may pro- 
voke me to anger. 



And to pour out drink-offerings] Hebrew, ve-hassak nesahkim, * and to 
pour out libations.' 

Chapter VIII. Verse 13. 
I will surely consume them, saith the Lord : there shall be no 
grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, and the leaf shall fade; 
and the things that I have given them shall pass away from them. 



There shall be no grapes on the vine] Hebrew, ain anahvim bag-gephen, 
'no grapes [grape-bunches] on the vine.' 



Chapter XII. Verse 10. 
Many pastors have destroyed my vineyard, they have trodden my 
portion under foot, they have made my pleasant portion a desolate 
wilderness. 



My vineyard] Hebrew, karmi, 'my vineyard.' 



Chapter XIII. Verse 12, 13. 
12 Therefore thou shalt speak unto them this word ; Thus saith the 
Lord God of Israel, Every bottle shall be filled with wine : and they 
shall say unto thee, Do we not certainly know that every bottle shall 
be filled with wine ? 13 Then shalt thou say unto them, Thus saith 
the Lord, Behold, I will fill all the inhabitants of this land, even the 
kings that sit upon David's throne, and the priests, and the prophets, 
and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, with drunkenness. 



V. 12. Every bottle shall be filled with wine] Hebrew [twice], kahl 

navel yimmaklla yayin, ' every skin -bottle shall be filled with wine.' The Lxx. 

has askos oinou, ' a skin-bag of wine ' ; Symmachus, kraieer, ' bowl ' ; Aquila, 

lageenion, which reappears in the V., laguncula vino, 'a small flagon with wine.' 

24 



1 86 JEREMIAH, XIX. 1 3. 



V. 13. I will fill . . . with drunkenness] Hebrew, memalla . . . 
shikkahron, '(I am) filling with drunkenness.' Lxx., methusmati, 'with strong 
drink.' V., ebrietate, 'with inebriety.' Dr Henderson has this note: — "These 
bottles are frequently of a large size. On entering the city of Tiflis, in 1821, the 
author found the market-place full of such bottles, consisting of the skins of oxen, 
calves, etc., distended with wine, the parts at which the head and legs had been cut 
off having been closely sewed up, so as not to allow the liquor to ooze out. It is 
from this custom that our English word ' hogshead ' is derived, that term being 
evidently a corruption of ox-hide." [Why not derived from hog's-hide ?] 



What God says in this passage He will do, is to be taken as done providentially 
in consequence of the guilty conduct of the Jewish people. Being addicted to the 
intemperance Isaiah had predicted [see Note on Isa. xxviii 7, 8], and of which 
Jeremiah was an eye-witness six centuries before Christ, he warns them that their 
self-induced drunkenness and idolatry would act with all the' force of a divine 
visitation. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 7. 
Neither shall men tear themselves for them in mourning, to comfort 
them for the dead; neither shall men give them the cup of consola- 
tion to drink for their father or for their mother. 



The cup of consolation] Hebrew, has tankhumim, ' a cup of consolations ' ; 
Lxx., poteerion eis parakleesin, 'a cup for consolation'; the V., potwn calicis ad 
consolandum, ' a draught of a cup for consolation.' 



It appears that it had become a custom with the Jews to administer drink of some 
kind to persons attending funeral rites. The prophet's allusion to the custom is not 
to be regarded as a sign of his approval. Wakes are an imitation of, if not derivation 
from, this ancient practice ; and the introduction of intoxicating liquors on such 
occasions has had the most pernicious effects. Such cups of consolation have 
frequently become cups of confusion. Religion proffers another and very different 
cup to the bereaved and afflicted. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 8. 
Thou shalt not also go into the house of feasting, to sit with them 
to eat and to drink. 



The HOUSE of FEASTING] Hebrew, uvaith-mishteh, 'and a house of feasting.' 



Chapter XIX. Verse 13. 
And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, 
shall be defiled as the place of Tophet, because of all the houses upon 
whose roofs they have burned incense unto all the host of heaven, 
.and have poured out drink-offerings unto other gods. 



And have poured out drink-offerings] Hebrew, ve-hassak nhahkim, 
and to pour out libations.' 



JEREMIAH, XXV. 1 5 — 1 7, 27, 28. 1 87 

Chapter XXIII. Verse 9. 

Mine heart within me is broken because of the prophets ; all my 
bones shake ; I am like a drunken man, and like a man whom wine 
hath overcome, because of the Lord, and because of the words of his 
holiness. 



Like A drunken man] Hebrew, ke-ish shikkor, 'like a man drunk'; Lxx., 
hos aneer suntetrimmenos, * as a vigorous man worn away ' ; V., quasi vir ebrius, 
* as a strong man drunk. ' 

And like a man whom wine hath overcome] Hebrew, uk-gever avahro 
yayin, 'and like a strong man whom wine has overwhelmed (or oppressed).' 
From ahvar, ' to pass over,' comes the figurative sense of ' to overwhelm ' as by the 
action of water. Lxx., kai hos anthropos sunechomenos apo oinou, ' and as a man 
overcome by wine.' The V., quasi homo madidus d vino, 'as a man sodden by 
wine.' 



It is the strong man as well as the ordinary man who becomes the prey of strong 
drink. The signs of this conquest are the ' broken-down heart ' and the ' shrinking 
bones.' No other conqueror leaves deeper traces of his power than does Alcohol, 
to whom the strongest of men have succumbed. Indeed, none are safe while this 
enemy is admitted within the gates of the lips ; excluding it, the weakest are secure. 
In the contest (1 Esdras iii. and iv.) between the three Persian guards of Darius, 
as to who should indite the wisest saying, the one who wrote, ' Wine is strong 
above other things,' is made to exclaim, " O sirs ! how exceeding strong is wine ! 
It makes all men to err who drink it. It makes the mind of the king and of the 
fatherless child, of the slave and the freeman, of the poor man and the rich, to be 
all one ; it inclines the mind to ease and mirth, and to remember neither sadness 
nor debt, and it makes every heart rich, and causes forgetfulness of king and magis- 
trate ; and it makes everything to be spoken by talents [the Syriac has ' as by weight 
talents ' ; the idea is that wine forces men to speak by a weight they cannot resist]. 
And when they have drunk, they remember to love neither friends nor brethren ; 
and in a little time they draw out their swords ; and when they have recovered 
from their wine, they know not what they have done. O sirs ! does not wine 
excel all else, because it compels this to be done ? ' The one who wrote, ' The 
king is strong above others,' defends his theme; but the prize is awarded to the 
third, Zorobabel, who had written, 'Women are strong above all, but truth is 
victorious over all things.' Had the question been, Which is strongest for evil? 
the verdict might have been different. 



Chapter XXV. Verses 15 — 17, 27, 28. 

15 For thus saith the Lord God of Israel unto me ; Take the wine 
cup of this fury at my hand, and cause all the nations, to whom I 
send thee, to drink it. 16 And they shall drink, and be moved, and 
be mad, because of the sword that I will send among them. 17 Then 
took I the cup at the Lord's hand, and made all the nations to drink, 
unto whom the Lord had sent me. ... 27 Therefore thou shalt 
say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel ; 
Drink ye, and be drunken, and spue, and fall, and rise no more, 



1 88 JEREMIAH, XXXI. 5. 

because of the sword which I will send among you. 28 And it shall 
be, if they refuse to take the cup at thine hand to drink, then shalt 
thou say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of hosts ; Ye shall certainly 
drink. 



V. 15. Take the wine cup of this fury at my hand] Hebrew, qakh eth-kos 
hay-yayin hakhamah hazzoth miy-yahdi, 'take the cup of the wine (the cup of) 
this heat (fury) from my hand. ' The construction is peculiar. Dr Henderson 
considers that in hay-yayin hakhamah, ' the wine, the heat, ' the khamah is taken 
adjectively, as if we should say ' the angry wine.' Lxx., labe to poteerion tou oinou 
tou akratou toutou ek cheiros mou, ' take the cup of this unmixed wine from my 
hand.' V., sume calicem vini furoris hujus de manu mea, 'take the cup of the 
wine of this fury from my hand.' 

V. 16. And they shall drink, and be moved, and be mad] Hebrew, 
ve-shahthu, ve-hithgoashu, ve-hithhotahlu, ' and they have drunk, and have reeled 
and have become furious ' (z. e. they will be so) ; Lxx., kai piontai, kai exemountai 
kai ekmaneesontai, ' and they shall drink, and vomit forth and be furious ' ; V., et 
bibent et turbabuntur et insanient, 'and they shall drink and be confused and 
become mad.' 



No mention is made in this passage of mingling in this ' cup of fury ' any drugs 
to render the intoxicating wine more heady and inflaming. The Lxx., indeed, gives 
to khamah [heat = poison, or fury] the force of 'unmixed,' to indicate that the 
wine is as strong as fermentation can make it. The art of ' fortifying ' fermented 
wine with distilled spirit was reserved for a later age. The opinion that a liquor, 
capable of representing calamities so dreadful is at the same time suitable for daily 
use, cannot too soon pass away from among sane men. The language of the verses 
27 and 28 is full of warning. The symbol and instrument of their sin becomes the 
symbol, and in part the instrument, of their overthrow. ' Drink and become sur- 
charged ' is the inexorable and irresistible mandate to those who have persevered 
in wrong-doing. The cup of their pleasure is the sign of their punishment. This 
is no arbitrary arrangement, for that which inflames is a fit symbol of Divine 
wrath ; and that which debauches does, in the very nature of things, prepare the 
debauched for destruction. ' Lust, when it conceives, brings forth sin : and sin, 
when it is finished, brings forth death.' 'There is a way which seemeth right 
unto a man, but the end thereof are the ways of death.' 

[See Notes on Job xxi. 20; Psa. xi. 6; lxxv. 8; Isa. li. 17, 22; Lam. iv. 21 J 
Ezek. xxiii. 31 — 34; Rev. xiv. 10, 19; xvi. 19; xviii. 6.] 



Chapter XXXI. Verse 5. 

Thou shalt yet plant vines upon the mountains of Samaria : the 
planters shall plant, and shall eat them as common things. 



Vines] Hebrew, kerahmim, 'vineyards.' 

And shall eat them as common things] Hebrew, ve-khillalu, 'and shall 
use (or appropriate),' i. e. they shall not have the produce of their vineyards 
carried off by the invader, but possess them for the purposes of sustenance and 
commerce. 



JEREMIAH, XXXI. 12, 14, 25, 29, 30. 1 89 

Chapter XXXI. Verse 12. 
Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and 
shall flow together to the goodness of the Lord, for wheat, and for 
wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd : 
and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not 
sorrow any more at all. 



For wheat, and for wine, and for oil] Hebrew, al dahgan, ve-al tirosh, 
ve-al yitzhar, 'with corn, and with vine-fruit, and with olive-and-orchard-fruit.' 
This famous triad of natural products reappears, significantly called ' the goodness 
of the Lord,' the tithes of which were to be presented to Jehovah in grateful 
acknowledgment of His mercies. Lxx., epi geen sitou, kai oinou, kai karpon, * and 
upon a land of corn, and of wine, and of fruits.' This translation of yitzhar hy 
'fruits,' instead of by 'oil,' shows that the Greek translator of this passage had a 
perception of the breadth of meaning included under that collective term. V., 
super frumento, et vino, et oleo, ' and upon corn, and wine, and oil. ' 



Chapter XXXI. Verse 14. 
And I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my 
people shall be satisfied with my goodness, saith the Lord. 



And I will satiate] Hebrew, ve-rivvaithi, 'and I have satiated.' The verb 
is rahvah. Lxx. methuso, V. inebriabo, ' I will fill to the full. ' [The words 
' shall be satisfied ' in the last clause of the verse are the rendering of another word, 
yisbahu, from sah-ba, ' to satisfy,' used most frequently for being filled or satisfied 
with food, as rahvah and shahkar are used of being charged or satiated with 
drink. ] 



Chapter XXXI. Verse 25. 
For I have satiated the weary soul, and I have replenished every 
sorrowful soul. 



I have satiated] Hebrew, hirvaithi, from rahvah, as above. 



Chapter XXXI. Verses 29, 30. 
29 In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a 
sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge. 30 But every 
one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour 
grape, his teeth shall be set on edge. 



V. 29. A sour grape] Hebrew, voser, ' that which is sour ' ; — the word ' grape ' 
is supplied by A. V. Voser is collectively used of a bunch of berries or grapes, 
well developed but not ripe. Lxx. omphaka (accusative of omphax), V. uvam 
acerbam, 'a sour grape.' 

V. 30. The sour grape] Hebrew, hav-voser, 'the sour bunch.' 



190 JEREMIAH, XXXV. 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 15. 

For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel ; Houses and 
fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land. 



And vineyards] Hebrew, ukerahmim, ' and vineyards (plantations).' 



Chapter XXXII. Verse 29. 

And the Chaldeans, that fight against this city, shall come and set 
fire on this city, and burn it with the houses, upon whose roofs they 
have offered incense unto Baal, and poured out drink offerings unto 
other gods, to provoke me to anger. 



And poured out drink offerings] Hebrew, ve-kissiku nesahkim, 'and 
poured out libations.' 

Chapter XXXV. Verses i — 19. 

1 The word which came unto Jeremiah from the Lord in the days 
of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah, saying, 2 Go unto the 
house of the Rechabites, and speak unto them, and bring them into 
the house of the Lord, into one of the chambers, and give them 
wine to drink. 3 Then I took Jaazaniah, the son of Jeremiah, the 
son of Habaziniah, and his brethren, and all his sons, and the whole 
house of the Rechabites ; 4 And I brought them into the house of 
the Lord, into the chamber of the sons of Hanan, the son of 
Igdaliah, a man of God, which was by the chamber of the princes, 
which was above the chamber of Maaseiah the son of Shallum, the 
keeper of the door: 5 And I set before the sons of the house of the 
Rechabites pots full of wine, and cups, and I said unto them, Drink 
ye wine. 6 But they said, We will drink no wine : for Jonadab the 
son of Rechab our father commanded us, saying, Ye shall drink no 
wine, neither ye, nor your sons for ever : 7 Neither shall ye build 
house, nor sow seed, nor plant vineyard, nor have any : but all your 
days ye shall dwell in tents ; that ye may live many days in the land 
where ye be strangers. 8 Thus have we obeyed the voice of Jonadab 
the son of Rechab our father in all that he hath charged us, to drink 
no wine all our days, we, our wives, our sons, nor our daughters; 
9 Nor to build houses for us to dwell in : neither have we vineyard, 
nor field, nor seed : 10 But we have dwelt in tents, and have obeyed, 
and done according to all that Jonadab our father commanded us. 
11 But it came to pass, when Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came 
up into the land, that we said, Come, and let us go to Jerusalem for 
fear of the army of the Chaldeans, and for fear of the army of the 
Syrians : so we dwell at Jerusalem. 12 Then came the word of the 
Lord unto Jeremiah, saying, 13 Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the 
God of Israel ; Go and tell the men of Judah and the inhabitants of 
Jerusalem, Will ye not receive instruction to hearken to my words ? 
saith the Lord. i 4 The words of Jonadab the son of Rechab, that he 



JEREMIAH, XXXV. 191 



commanded his sons not to drink wine, are performed ; for unto this 
day they drink none, but obey their father's commandment : notwith- 
standing I have spoken unto you, rising early and speaking ; but ye 
hearkened not unto me. 15 1 have sent also unto you all my ser- 
vants the prophets, rising up early and sending them, saying, Return 
ye now every man from his evil way, and amend your doings, and go 
not after other gods to serve them, and ye shall dwell in the land 
which I have given to you and to your fathers : but ye have not 
inclined your ear, nor hearkened unto me. 16 Because the sons of 
Jonadab the son of Rechab have performed the commandment of 
their father, which he commanded them; but this people hath not 
hearkened unto me : 17 Therefore thus saith the Lord God of hosts, 
the God of Israel, Behold, I will bring upon Judah and upon all the 
inhabitants of Jerusalem all the evil that I have pronounced against 
them ; because I have spoken unto them, but they have not heard ; 
and I have called unto them, but they have not answered. 18 And 
Jeremiah said unto the house of the Rechabites, Thus saith the 
Lord of hosts, the God of Israel ; Because ye have obeyed the com- 
mandment of Jonadab your father, and kept all his precepts, and 
done according unto all that he hath commanded you : 19 Therefore 
thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel ; Jonadab the son of 
Rechab shall not want a man to stand before me forever. 



V. 2. The house of the Rechabites] Hebrew, baith hah-Rakahvim, ' the 
house ( = family) of the Rechabites.' Lxx., eis oikon Archabein. V., ad domum 
Rechabitarum. 

And give them wine to drink] Hebrew, ve-hishqithah otham yayin, 'and 
give them to drink wine.' So Lxx., potieis autous oinon ; and V., dabis eis bibere 
vinum. 

V. 5. Pots full of wine, and cups] Hebrew, geviim mllaim yayin ve-kosoth, 
'bowls (or jars) full of wine, and cups,' — the cups to be filled from the jars ; Lxx., 
keramion oinou kai poteeria, 'a vessel {amphora) of wine, and cups ' ; V., scyphos 
plenos vino et calices, ' goblets filled with wine, and cups.' 

Drink ye wine] Hebrew, shethu yayin, ' drink ye wine.' So Lxx., piete oinon; 
and V., bibite vinum. 

V. 6. We will drink no wine] Hebrew, lo nishieh yayin, ' we do not drink 
wine.' The so called future tense may here be fitly regarded as an indefinite pre- 
sent, the reply of the Rechabites being, ' We do not drink wine — it is our custom 
not to drink wine,' with an implied resolution to persevere in the custom so well 
approved by a long experience. Lxx., ou mee piomen oinon, 'we surely may not 
drink wine ' ; V., non bibemus vinum, ' we will not drink wine.' 

Jonadab the son of Rechab] Hebrew, Yonahdab ben Rakav, 'Jonadab 
son of Rechab. ' The name ' Jonadab ' signifies ' whom the Lord impels ' ; while 
Rechab [Rakav, or Rakab~] signifies 'a horseman.' Ben, 'son,' has in Hebrew 
a comprehensive range of meaning, and is often equivalent to ' descendant ' on 
the father's side. This passage does not, therefore, necessarily denote that Rechab 
was Jonadab' s own or immediate father, though he may have been either that or 
a remote ancestor. 



192 JEREMIAH, XXXV. 



Ye shall drink no wine, neither ye, nor your sons forever] Hebrew, 
lo thishtu yayin, ate?n, uvenaikem, ad ulahm, ' you are not to drink wine, you and 
your sons forever.' 

V. 7. Nor plant vineyards] Hebrew, ve-kerem lo thittahu, ' and a vineyard 
ye are not to plant.' 

V. 8. To drink no wine. V. 14. Not to drink wine] The Hebrew in 
each place is le-vilti shethoth yayin, ' so as not to drink wine.' 

V. 9. Vineyard] Hebrew, kerem. 

V. 19. JONADAB THE SON OF RECHAB SHALL NOT WANT A MAN TO STAND 
BEFORE me forever] Hebrew, lo yikkahrath ish le- Yonahdab ben-Rakab ortiad le- 
phanai kahl hay-yahmim, 'there shall not fail to Jonadab the son of Rechab a man 
standing before me all the days ' (= for all time). 

The expectation of the Rechabites was to ' live long in the land wherein they 
were strangers ' ; but the language of the prophet, as if with a foresight of the ruin 
to fall upon the land and people, singularly changes, and becomes the vehicle of a 
broader and more perpetual benediction. 



I. Many questions of great interest are suggested by this chapter ; as, — 

(1) Who were the Rechabites ? We read in I Chron. ii. 55, "And the families 
of the scribes which dwelt at Jabez ; the Tirathites, the Shimeathites, and Suchath- 
ites. These are the Kenites that came of Hemath, the father of the house of 
Rechab." The Rechabites, then, were a branch of the Kenite stock which sprang, 
through Midian, from Abraham and Keturah.* Hobab, the brother-in-law of 
Moses, is considered by Arabian tradition as the head of the tribe, which divided 
into the Hobabites and Rechabites. Dr Wolff met, in 1836, the sheikh of the 
'tribe of Hobab,' who spoke of the B'nee Arhab (children of Rechab) as another 
branch of his descendants. The Kenites (Qaini'm the Hebrew) were always the 
friends and allies of the Israelites, and seem to have attended them in the desert, 
and to have entered Canaan with them ; but the claims recently set up for the 
Kenites by Mr Bunsen, of having contributed to the Hebrew monarchy its most 
valuable elements, go far beyond the proof. The theory that David was of a 
Kenite family involves consequences that insure its rejection. To sum up, the 
Rechabites were a Kenite clan, and had embraced the fundamental principles of 
Judaism. Jahn thinks they were 'proselytes of the gate.' 

(2) Who was Rechab the father of Jonadab? The name Rechab — 'rider,' 
* cavalier,' or 'horseman' — is given in 2 Sam. iv. 2 to a leader of one of the two 
bands enlisted in the cause of Ish-bosheth. These captains, Baanah and Rechab, 
were sons of Rimmon, a Benjamite. In Neh. iii. 14, mention is made of Malchiah 
the son of Rechab. This Malchiah was ruler of part of Beth-haccerem, a town of 
Judah, and he repaired one of the gates of Jerusalem at the time of the restoration. 
The Rechab named in I Chron. ii. 55, is clearly identical with the Rechab of this 
chapter. When his ancestor Hemath (Hebrew, 'Khammath') flourished is not 
said. Rechab was the father of Jonadab, and must therefore have lived above 
three centuries before the date of the transaction here recorded. It is barely 

* It is not to our purpose to conjecture what relation these bore to the Nabatheans from Syria, 
named in the ancient book of Kuthami, recently discovered by Prof. Chwolson {Ketab-as-Shu- 
mum, ' The Book of Poisons '), or to the same people dwelling at Petrje, mentioned in the history 
of Diodorus Siculus. We merely note that from the remotest antiquity abstainers existed on 
physical, social, and religious grounds, and that their influence was seen, within the historic period, in 
the Rechabites of Scripture, and in the Essenes, Therapeutae, Sabians and Rakusians of later 
times. The principle became inwoven with various forms of faith, and was adopted from the Ra- 
kusians by Mohammed, with such marvellous advantage to his mission and people (at that time 
very intemperate) that we may well wonder at the slackness of the Church in employing so potent an 
auxiliary for its higher and holier objects. 



JEREMIAH, XXXV. 1 93 



possible that he may have been a much earlier ancestor of Jonadab — some writers 
regarding him as the same with Hobab, — but as the founder of a distinct 'house,' 
or clan bearing his name, he was more famous than many of his Kenite brethren. 
His name of ' cavalier ' may have been given to him as a recognition of his military 
prowess. One theory, broached by Bouldac, a learned writer of the sixteenth 
century, would explain away from this passage a personal Rechab. Proceeding 
on the premiss that the name Rekeb (which differs only in the Masorite pointing 
from Rakab), signifying 'a chariot,' was borne by Elijah, and afterward by Elisha, 
as the spiritual guardians of Israel, it is conceived that their disciples, 'the sons 
of the prophets,' became known as the 'sons of the chariot'; and that the 
Rachab or Recheb of whom Jonadab is said to have been the son, was not any 
Kenite father, but Elisha, the spiritual Recheb of Israel. A Jewish tradition rep- 
resents Jonadab as a disciple of Elisha ; but why should he have been singled out 
as a ' son of Rechab ' if the designation would have been equally applicable to all 
the members of the prophetical school of Elijah and Elisha? The Rechab of 
Jeremiah we may accept as a Kenite chief, and perhaps the immediate father of 
Jonadab. 

(3) Who, then, was Jonadab ? If, as there is no reason to doubt, this Jonadab 
is the same with the 'Jonadab the son of Rechab ' mentioned in 2 Kings x. 15, 16, 
23, we have indisputable evidence that he lived in the time of Ahab, Jehoram, 
and Jehu, kings of Israel, and was in the vigor of his manhood about B. c. 880, 
or nearly three hundred years before the date of the transaction named in this 
chapter. The remarkable interview between Jonadab and Jehu is described in 
terms evincing the high social position occupied by the former, and the desire of the 
latter to enlist him in his pretended enterprise of ' zeal for Jehovah.' While head of 
his paternal clan, much of his unbounded influence over it was probably derived from 
his well-tried sagacity and courage. The Rechabites may have begun to forsake 
the nomadic life of their Kenite brethren, and to follow the habits common in the 
cities of Palestine. He discerned the peril attendant upon this course, and there- 
fore enjoined a mode of life altogether different. "Ye shall drink no wine, 
neither ye, nor your sons for ever : neither shall ye build house, nor sow seed, nor 
plant vineyards, nor have any: but all your days ye shall dwell in tents; that ye 
may live many days in the land where ye be strangers." They were, in short, to 
resume the pastoral, migratory life of their ancestors, and to unite with this a rule of 
inflexible abstinence from wine. His object was at once social, sanitary, and moral, 
rendering necessary the removal of his tribe from the intemperance and general 
corruption which so long continued to pervade the town populations of Israel and 
Judah. He thus aimed to insure for them the Divine favor, and (as the result of 
both spiritual and natural laws) their physical longevity and tranquil residence in 
the land. The note in Bagster's ' Treasury Bible ' is a mixture of just and of hasty 
reflection: — "Jonadab, a man of fervent zeal for the pure worship of God, had 
probably practised these rules himself; and having trained up his children to 
habits of abstemiousness, he enjoined them and their posterity to adhere to them. 
In these regulations he seems to have had no religious, but merely a prudential 
view, as is intimated in the reason annexed to them, ' that ye may live many days 
in the land where ye be strangers.' " Now in Deut. iv. 40, and other places, 
' living long in the land ' is the blessing attached to obedience to the Divine com- 
mand, and Jonadab, as a devout man, was desirous that this blessing should be 
inherited by his family through successive generations. The editor, as the next 
paragraph shows, cannot deny that the whole purport of the institution was a 
religious one, namely, that Arabians or foreigners might live amongst the Jews as 
25 



194 JEREMIAH, XXXV. 



perpetual ' strangers,' accepting for their compensation the knowledge of the Jewish 
law, and the Divine truth as it should come to the Hebrews, from whose civil 
privileges they were voluntarily excluded. " And this would be the natural con- 
sequence of observing these rules, for their temperate mode of living would very 
much contribute to preserve health and prolong life, and they would avoid giving 
umbrage or exciting the jealousy and envy of the Jews, who might have been pro- 
voked by their engaging and succeeding in the principal business in which they 
themselves were engaged — agriculture and vine-dressing — to expel them from their 
country, by which they would have been deprived of the religious advantages they 
enjoyed." The prohibition against wine extended to all yayin (as in the case of 
the Nazarites, whom Jonadab perhaps had in view), so that the possibility of error 
might be excluded. It may be confidently assumed that shakar was also involved 
in the proscription. 

II. The fidelity with which the Rechabites adhered to the regulation of abstinence 
from wine, instihited by Jonadab, is forcibly. presented in this narrative. 

(i) It was of long duration, having continued for three centuries at the least. 
Their abstinence had grown into an easy and hereditary custom. 

(2) It was, however, no blind and unreasoning conformity to precedent, springing 
from respect to their great ancestor's memory, of whom they were justiy proud; but 
was sustained by the constant experience of the benefits it secured. They learnt 
that Jonadab had given them wise counsel, and their veneration for his character 
was thus perpetually renewed from a sense of the advantages continuously accruing. 
Though from stress of circumstances their nomadic life had to be intermitted, and 
was perhaps never resumed by the entire tribe, they remained inflexible as to 
abstinence from wine, which precept was evidently regarded as the essential pivot 
of the ancestral institution. 

(3) It was proof against an unexpected and peculiar trial. Unknown to them- 
selves they were selected by God to act out a parable for the reproof of their allies, 
the Jewish people. He who knew all hearts knew their fidelity; and the trial to 
which He put them was severe, but not greater than they could bear. We can 
imagine their curiosity when they were visited by Jeremiah the prophet, and 
invited to accompany him, for a purpose not yet declared. Responding to his 
call, Jaazaniah, the then head of the clan, with his brethren and sons, and the 
whole ' house ' of the Rechabites — that is, all the male adults — accompanied the 
prophet into one of the large chambers surrounding the naos or temple ; and being 
assembled there, how would their curiosity change to astonishment when Jeremiah, 
having filled the vessels and cups full of wine, addressed to them the exhortation, 
' Drink ye wine ' ! Observe, Jeremiah does not use the binding formula ' Thus 
saith the Lord,' neither does he urge fallacious reasons for drinking, or direct his 
influence to induce them to drink. He tests them, but he does not solicit or tempt. 
Perplexed, no doubt, at discovering the purpose for which they were convened, 
they yet replied with dignity and firmness to the prophet, and the interview closed. 
They would learn soon afterward the real object for which they had been assem- 
bled, and their faith in their father's wisdom and their gratitude to the God of 
Israel would be enhanced when Jeremiah, paying them a second visit, uttered the 
benediction which he had been commanded to pronounce. 

III. The blessing may be regarded in relation to the past and the future. 

(1) Why was it bestowed? The answer is supplied by verses 16, 18, 19; but a 
further inquiry arises : Was the blessing given solely on account of the obedience 
of the Rechabites ? or had it respect to the nature of the command obeyed ? A 
careful examination of the narrative will lead to a rejection of both the extreme 



JEREMIAH, XXXV. 1 95 



opinions that have been held : by some, that the obedience alone, irrespective of 
the subject-matter, was approved ; and by others, that the benediction was given 
principally, or exclusively, on account of the thing commanded. Unless we 
can imagine that God would bless obedience to a sinful or foolish precept, by 
whomsoever enjoined; or that He would have selected for His special approval 
obedience to a rule neutral in its moral character, or observed from superstitious 
motives, or from mere tyranny of custom, we may reasonably conclude that this 
example was expressly chosen because it suited in all respects the Divine intention, 
viz., to contrast the laudable fidelity of the Rechabites to a wholesome civil regu- 
lation of their earthly father, with the shameful unfaithfulness of the Jewish people 
to the spiritual authority of their all- wise and heavenly Parent. 

(2) What the blessing included, is denned by the promise that there should never 
fail a descendant of Jonadab to stand before the Lord. The usual signification 
attached to these words is that of perpetual existence, — a prophecy that the house 
of the Rechabites should never become extinct. Professor Plumptre [Art. • Re- 
chabites ' in Smith's * Dictionary of the Bible'] argues that the phrase 'to stand 
before me ' (Jehovah) is to be taken in the sense which it bears in numerous other 
passages — that of ministering or serving; and hence that the promise was one of 
religious privilege, to be enjoyed by the family that had given such distinguished 
evidence of fidelity to their honored ancestor. Having been faithful in compara- 
tively a small thing, they were to be intrusted with a more excellent commission. 
It cannot certainly be contended that the phrase 'to stand before,' either God 
or man, has in Scripture the exclusive sense of ' to minister ' ; yet there are several 
singular facts cited by Professor Plumptre which make it not improbable that the 
Rechabites, both before and after the captivity, were associated with the service of 
the Holy Place. According to one Jewish tradition, there were intermarriages 
between the daughters of the Rechabites and the Levitical tribe. The name 
of Rechabite continued to be remarkably associated with that section of the Jews 
whose morality was the purest, and who were among the first to favor the Christian 
faith. Eusebius quotes from Hegesippus a statement, that while James the Just, 
supposed to be the Lord's brother, Bishop of Jerusalem and author of ' The General 
Epistle of St James,' was being stoned, "one of the priests of the sons of the 
Rechabites mentioned by Jeremiah the prophet cried out, protesting against the 
crime." Epiphanius refers this protest to Symeon, a brother of James. Mr 
Plumptre adds, "We may accept him [Hegesippus] as an additional witness to 
the existence of the Rechabites as a recognized body up to the destruction of Jeru- 
salem, sharing in the ritual of the temple, partly descended from the old ' sons of 
Jonadab,' partly recruited by the incorporation into their ranks of men devoting 
themselves, as did James and Symeon, to the same consecrated life." If the 
Rechabites were united with the Jewish people before the destruction of Jerusalem, 
the prophesy may be considered as still in course of fulfillment, by their having 
blended with the Jewish race, though now lost to our view as a distinct body of 
worshipers. 

(3) Whether the above theory be accepted or not, it is still open for us to construe 
the special blessing on the Rechabites in the sense of perpetuated existence, as a 
promise that, amidst the mutations of empires and destruction of tribes, the family 
of Jonadab should never become extinct. It would not be necessary to our faith 
in this word of the Most High, to prove the preservation of the Rechabites under 
a separate name, for without this separation the promise might be carried out to 
the letter. Yet evidence of the kind alluded to cannot fail to be of peculiar 
interest; and such evidence exists. Benjamin of Tudela, a traveler of the twelfth 



196 JEREMIAH, XXXV. 



century, mentions that near El Jubar he found Rechabites who were Jews, to the 
number of 100,000, who abstained from wine, and were governed by a prince, 
Salomon ben-Nasi, who traced his genealogy to the house of David. In modern 
times, Arabs claiming to be veritable descendants of Jonadab have been seen. 
About the year 1824, Dr Wolff, when on a mission to his Jewish brethren and 
others in the East, was traveling over the vast plains of Mesopotamia with a 
caravan 5,000 strong, and while he was preaching "a Bedouin cavalier ap- 
proached. Dismounting from his horse, he passed through the crowd till he came 
to Wolff, when he looked in his Bible, and to Wolff's great surprise he began to 
read Hebrew. Wolff asked him who he was. He replied, ' I am one of the 
descendants of Hobab, Moses' brother-in-law, and of the branch called the B'nee- 
Arhab, children of Rechab, who live in the deserts of Yemen. We drink no wine, 
plant no vineyard, sow no seed, and live in tents. And thus you see how the 
prophesy is fulfilled, ' Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand 
before Me forever.' Saying this he rode off, leaving behind him the strongest 
evidence of the truth of Sacred Writ." In 1836, when in Arabia, Wolff was told that 
the B'nee-Arhab were besieging the town of Sanaa. Riding on to that town he 
was quickly surrounded by these sons of the desert. " Then both they and Wolff 
dismounted, and sitting down with them, he told them that he had seen, twelve 
years back, one of their nation in Mesopotamia, Moosa by name. Rechabites — ' Is 
your name Joseph Wolff ? ' Wolff. — 'Yes.' They embraced him, and said they 
were still in possession of the Bible which he had given to Moosa. Thus Wolff 
spent six days with the children of Rechab. They drink no wine, and plant no 
vineyard, and sow no seed, and live in tents, and remember good old Jonadab, the 
son of Rechab. And Wolff found in their company children of Israel, of the tribe 
of Dan, who reside in Hatramawt. The children of Rechab say, ' We will fight 
one day the battles of the Messiah.'" — (Travels and Adventures of Dr Wolff, 
Edit. 1861, pp. 195 and 508.) Signor Pierotti, in a paper on 'Recent Notices 
of the Rechabites,' read at the meeting of the British Association (October, 1862), 
states that he met with a tribe of that name near the Dead Sea. They had a 
Hebrew Bible, and said their prayers at the tomb of a Jewish rabbi. It is not 
improbable that while a portion of the tribe settled down in the Holy Land, and 
quickly merged in the Jewish people, a still larger number resumed their desert 
life, who retain their identity, and the memory of their origin, down to this day. 

IV. Among the lessons inferrible from the narrative, as a whole, may be enumer- 
ated the following : — 

1. That abstinence, for physical and moral ends, from intoxicating liquors, is, at 
least, lawful, not foolish or sinful. 

2. That such abstinence is, in fact, favorable to health and moral purity. 
As to health, the experience of the Rechabites is invaluable for all ages. This rule 
preserved them from all the admittedly harmful effects of intemperance, and from 
those injuries — less recognized, but equally real — to constitutional vigor and stamina 
induced by habitual ' moderate ' drinking. As to moral purity, — in rendering 
drunkenness impossible, what a flood of all the vices was diverted from this tribe! 
and what aids to moral self-control and culture were afforded to its members ! 
Dr Guthrie has well said, " Happy family ! — of how few, if any, of ours could 
it be said ? — in which, for three hundred years, there had never been a drunkard to 
break a mother's heart, to bring shame over those who loved him, and to fill a 
dishonored grave ! Such was Jonadab' s, and such how many sad mourners have 
wished that theirs had been so ! Holding prevention to be better than cure [or 
attempt at cure], and that, as all experience proves, it is much easier to keep 



JEREMIAH, XL. 10, 12. 1 97 

people out of temptation than save them in it, Jonadab, when enjoining his 
descendants to drink no wine, seeks to protect them from temptation, forbidding 
them — though they might have used the fruit of the vine in many other ways than 
drink — to plant a vineyard. Peace of conscience and purity of mind turn much 
more on our avoiding than [in courting with the hope of ] resisting temptations. 
It is wiser, if it be possible, to flee than to fight them ; a great truth taught us by 
a higher authority than Jonadab. It stands embodied in the Lord's Prayer — and 
that not the least important of its petitions, — ' Lead us not into temptation.' " 

3. That when practised from a principle of duty, fidelity to abstinence is approved 
by God. And well it might, when we reflect on the circumstances of this noble 
example, which we are invited to follow with such incomparably less sacrifice. 
They willingly, nay, joyfully, gave up many of the ordinary ambitions and privileges 
of citizens, that they might secure 'the one thing needful,' and dwell as strangers 
with those who had the light of Divine truth ; and for this end, at this expense, 
these Arabian truth-seekers also abstained from all wine. Would that, in the 
modern Church, we had more persons like-minded, willing for the sake of the 
world's progress, and of the truth by which the world must be saved, to sacrifice even 
the love of a little liquor, and thereby secure for themselves, their families, and their 
neighbors, exemption from the manifold miseries and pollutions of intemperance ! 

4. That it is better to remain faithful to this abstinence, and to every practice 
proved to be safe and salutary, than to deviate from it at the persuasion even of 
men eminent for their position or personal worth. Jeremiah's act gives no sanction 
to the temptations so commonly addressed to abstainers to induce a violation of 
their principle and pledge ; for that act was directed by the Almighty, who foresaw 
the issue. But the example of the Rechabites is a confirmation of true principle, 
and a stimulus to consistency under trial. They would not deviate from their 
proved wholesome rule of life, though the wine had been stored in the temple, 
though it was set before them in holy vessels by the greatest prophet of the day, 
and though that prophet himself invited (mark ! he did not press) them to partake. 
They anticipated Paul's declaration as to 'a messenger from heaven' teaching 
any doctrine contrary to fact, preferring wise consistency to temporary indulgence, 
and the verdict of experience to the voice of apparent ' authority. ' Most nobly 
does their conduct compare with a not infrequent desertion of the Temperance 
cause because the wine-cup has been associated with the hand of friendship, the 
smile of beauty, the seal of fashion, or the solicitation of sensuous desire. Let 
vigilance and prayer (to which abstinence lends its aid) be ever exercised on the 
side of truth, and the time can never arrive when a courteous and dignified but 
inflexible refusal to drink intoxicating liquor will pass without reward. 



Chapter XXXIX. Verse 10. 

But Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard left of the poor of the 
people, which had nothing, in the land of Judah, and gave them vine- 
yards and fields at the same time. 



Vineyards] Hebrew, kerahmim. 



Chapter XL. Verses 10, 12. 

10 As for me, behold, I will dwell at Mizpah, to serve the Chaldeans, 
which will come unto us : but ye, gather ye •wine, and summer fruits 



I98 JEREMIAH, XLVIII. II, 12. 

and oil, and put them in your vessels, and dwell in your cities that 
ye have taken. ... 12 Even all the Jews returned out of all places 
whither they were driven, and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah, 
unto Mizpah, and gathered wine and summer fruits very much. 



V. 10. Gather ye wine] Hebrew, isphu yayin, 'gather ye wine'; Lxx., 
sunagagcte oinon, ' gather ye wine '; V., colligete vinde7niam, ' collect ye vintage-fruit.' 

V. 12. And gathered wine] Hebrew, vay-yaasphu yayin, 'and they gathered 
wine ' ; T. of Jonathan, khamrah, ' wine ' ; Lxx. kai suneegagon oinon, V. et 
colligerunt vinum, ' and they gathered wine.' The V. varies from vindemiam (ver. 
10) to vinum (ver. 12) in its rendering of yayin ; but both vinum and oinos are 
terms sometimes applied by classic writers to the fruit of the vine — whether figur- 
atively, or as the relic of a more ancient and popular usus loquendi, cannot now be 
certainly determined. As to yayin, its etymology plainly distinguishes it from 
tirosh, but that it should have been used by Gedaliah (ver. 10) in a matter-of-fact 
construction as synonymous with tirosh (vintage-fruit), and that it is again used by 
Jeremiah historically (ver. 12), indicates the absence of the modern prejudice, ' that 
the liquid fruit of the vine is not wine till it is fermented ' ! 

There is one passage as to oinos, in an ancient Greek author, which is the exact 
parallel to Gedaliah' s use of the Hebrew yayin. It is preserved in Athenseus 
(book vi., sect. 89), being an extract from the 'Voyage' of Nymphodorus, the 
Syracusan, who lived before Christ 320 — "At the time of festivals, he [Drimacus 
the General] went about, and took wine from the fields — ek ton agron oinon, — and 
such animals for victims as were in good condition." No one, we suppose, can 
carry prejudice so far as to impose upon himself the belief that fermented and 
bottled wine was thus 'taken from the fields.' 



Chapter XLVI. Verse 10. 

For this is the day of the Lord God of hosts, a day of vengeance, 
that he may avenge him of his adversaries: and the sword shall 
devour, and it shall be satiate and made drunk with their blood : for 
the Lord God of hosts hath a sacrifice in the north country by the 
river Euphrates. 



And made drunk with their blood] Hebrew, ve-rav-thah mid-dahmahm, 
and be surcharged with their blood'; Lxx., methustheesetai ; V., inebriabitur. 
[See Notes on Deut. xxxii. 42; Isa. xxxiv. 5, 8; xlvi. 26.] 



Chapter XLVIII. Verses ii, 12. 
11 Moab hath been at ease from his youth, and he hath settled on 
his lees, and hath not been emptied from vessel to vessel, neither hath 
he gone into captivity : therefore his taste remained in him, and his 
scent is not changed. 12 Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the 
Lord, that I will send unto him wanderers, that shall cause him to 
wander, and shall empty his vessels, and break their bottles. 



JEREMIAH, XLIX. 9. 1 99 

He hath settled on his lees] Hebrew, ve-shoqat hu el shemahrahv, 'and 
he has settled himself upon his lees ' ; Lxx., kai pepoithos een epi tee doxee autou, 
' and he has relied upon his glory ' j V., et requievit in fecibus suis, 'and he has 
settled on his dregs.' 



By a powerful image sensual Moab is compared to wine that had not been dis- 
turbed since it was put into its first vessel ; and the threatening goes forth that he 
shall resemble not only wine transferred from one vessel to another, but wine 
which runs out and is lost, because the vessels containing it are emptied and 
broken. [See Note on Zeph. i. 12.] 



Chapter XL VIII. Verse 26. 

Make ye him drunken : for he magnified himself against the Lord : 
Moab also shall wallow in his vomit, and he also shall be in derision. 



Make ye him drunken] Hebrew, hishkiru, 'make him drunk'; Lxx., me- 
thusate auton ; V., inebriate eum. The subsequent allusion to the state of Moab 
indicates the intoxicating nature of the drink he is supposed to have swallowed. 
The Moabites were reputed an intemperate people, and some writers have fancied 
a connection of this propensity with the circumstances under which the founder of 
the nation traced his descent from Lot. 



Chapter XLVIII. Verses 32, 33. 

32 O vine of Sibmah, I will weep for thee with the weeping of 
Jazer : thy plants are gone over the sea, they reach even to the sea 
of Jazer : the spoiler is fallen upon thy summer fruits and upon thy 
vintage. 33 And joy and gladness is taken from the plentiful field, 
and from the land of Moab ; and I have caused wine to fail from the 
winepresses : none shall tread with shouting ; their shouting shall be 
no snouting. 



V. 32. O vine of Sibmah] Hebrew, hag-gephen Sivmah, 'the vine of Sibmah.' 
For 'vine,' the Lxx. has ampelos ; the V., vinea. > [See Note on Isa. xvi. 6.] 

And upon THY vintage] Hebrew, ve al-betzirak, ' and upon thy cutting ' = 
the fruit of the vine cut off when ripe. Lxx., epi trugeetais sou, ' upon thy vintage- 
men'; V., et (super) vindemiam tuam, 'and upon thy vintage-fruit.' 

V. 33. And I have caused wine to fail from the winepresses] Hebrew, 
ve-yayin miqavim hishbati, 'and wine from the presses I have made to fail'; Lxx., 
kai oinos een epi leenois sou, 'and wine was in thy presses '; V., et vinum de tor- 
cularibus sustuli, 'and I have removed wine from thy presses.' 



Chapter XLIX. Verse 9. 

If grapegatherers come to thee, would they not leave some gleaning 
grapes ? if thieves by night, they will destroy till they have enough. 



200 JEREMIAH, LI. 7, 39, 5/. 

Grapegatherers] Hebrew, botzerim, ' cutters ' = those employed to cut off the 
grapes at the vintage season; Lxx., trugeetai, 'vintagers'; V., vindemiatores^ 
'vintage-men.' 

Some gleaning grapes] Hebrew, olaloth, 'gleanings'; Lxx., kataleimma, 
'a remnant'; V., racemum, 'a cluster.' 



Chapter XLIX. Verse 12. 
For thus saith the Lord : Behold, they whose judgment was not to 
drink of the cup have assuredly drunken ; and art thou he that shall 
altogether go unpunished? thou shalt not go unpunished, but thou 
shalt surely drink of it. 



The figure here, as in chap. xxv. 28, is that of a cup of retribution — intoxicating 
and prostrating — prepared by God for evil-doers; and which, despite their self- 
confidence — even where, as in the case of the Jews, they relied upon their 
Abrahamic relationship — they would be constrained to drink up. 



Chapter LI. Verse 7. 
Babylon hath been a golden cup in the Lord's hand, that made all 
the earth drunken : the nations have drunken of her wine ; therefore 
the nations are mad. 



That made all the earth drunken] Hebrew, meshakkereth kahl hah- 
ahretz, 'making drunk all the earth'; Lxx., methuskon ; V., inebrians. 

Of her wine] Hebrew, miy-yaynah, 'from her wine '; Lxx., apo tou oinou 
autees ; V., de vino ejus. 

Are mad] Hebrew, yithholelu, 'were infuriated'; Lxx., esaleutheesan, 'were 
shaken' (convulsed); V., commote sunt, 'have been perturbed.' 

The image of an intoxicating potion is again presented, and though the cup is 
'golden,' the effects are not less destructive. 



Chapter LI. Verses 39, 57. 
39 In their heat I will make their feasts, and I will make them 
drunken, that they may rejoice, and sleep a perpetual sleep, and not 
wake, saith the Lord. . . . 57 And I will make drunk her princes, and 
her wise men, her captains, and her rulers, and her mighty men : and 
they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the King, 
whose name is the Lord of hosts. 



V. 39. In their heat] Hebrew, be-khummahm, ' in their heat ' — the heat, says 
Gesenius, ' arising from wine.' Lxx., en tee thermasia auton ; V., in calore eorum. 

And I will make them drunken] Hebrew, ve-hishekkartim, 'and have 
caused them to be drunk '; Lxx., kai methuso autons ; V., et inebriabo eos. 

That they may rejoice] Hebrew, ll-maan ya-alozu, ' that they may exult '; 
Lxx., hopos karothosin, 'that they may be stupefied'; V., ut sopiantur, 'that they 
may be made senseless.' 



JEREMIAH, LII. l6. 201 



And sleep a perpetual sleep] Hebrew, ve-yashnu shenath olahm, 'and 
sleep a sleep forever.' 

V. 57. And I will make drunk] Hebrew, ve-hishekkarti, 'and I will make 
drunk.' 

Here God speaks, not as ordaining causes, but as connecting causes with effects. 
How this prophecy was fulfilled, secular history singularly testifies. [See Note 
on Dan. v. 1, 30.] 

Chapter LII. Verse 16. 

But Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard left certain of the poor 
of the land for vinedressers and for husbandmen. 



For vinedressers] Hebrew, le-koremim, 'for vineyarders.' 
26 



THE BOOK OF THE 

LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH. 



Chapter I. Verse 15. 
The Lord hath trodden under foot all my mighty men in the midst 
of me : he hath called an assembly against me to crush my young 
men : the Lord hath trodden the virgin, the daughter of Judah, as in 
a winepress. 



In A winepress] Hebrew, gath, 'the press.'* The marginal reading is, 'the 
winepress of the virgin.' Others propose, 'the Lord hath trodden the winepress 
as it respects the virgin.' 

Lxx. and V. have ' the Lord to the virgin daughter of Judah has trodden the 
winepress.' 



Chapter II. Verse 12. 
They say to their mothers, Where is corn and wine? when they 
swooned as the wounded in the streets of the city, when their soul 
was poured out into their mothers' bosom. 



Where is corn and wine?] Hebrew, ayya dahgan vah-yayin, 'where is corn 
and wine?' Yayin here seems (as in Jer. xl. 10, 12) to be substituted for tirosh, 
which in other places is uniformly connected with dahgan. In a country where 
grapes are an article of daily food it is natural that children should be described 
as crying out for them in the streets during a time of famine, especially since thirst 
would be equally allayed by sucking the grapes. Congruity and probability are 
alike shocked by supposing that little children would cry to their mothers for 
intoxicating drink because of the want of food and water! Lxx., pou seitos kai 
oinos, 'where is corn and wine? ' V., ubi est triticum et vinum? 'where is wheat 
and wine ? ' — the Syriac adds, ' and oil.' 



Chapter III. Verse 15. 
He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with 
wormwood. 

* It is to be noted, however, that this word is of wider use than 'press.' As Dindorf says, 
"the Hebrews truly distinguished^^ into two parts; the first they called gath higher, the other 
gath lower. The first is the place in which the grapes were trodden, the wine {vinum) flowing into 
a lacus beneath, through a tube." 



LAMENTATIONS, IV. 7. 203 

He hath made me drunken with wormwood] Hebrew, hirvani la-anah, 
*he hath satiated me with wormwood.' Rahvah here reappears, and answers to 
hisbiani, * he hath filled me ' (from sahba) in the first member of the sentence. 

J. G. Kohl, in his 'Travels in Austria,' notices a wine of wormwood in these 
terms : — " On Mount Badatschon, north of the Platten See, a kind of ' wine- 
decoction' is made, known as 'Badatschon Wormwood,' and as renowned in 
Hungary as the Tokay Essence. To make it, the juice is boiled with certain herbs. 
The same thing is done with the best of the Schomlau grapes, to produce ' Schomlau 
Wormwood.' "—(P. 374, Lond., 1845.) 



Chapter IV. Verse 7. 
Her Nazarites were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk, 
they were more ruddy in body than rubies, their polishing was of 
sapphire. 



A more literal rendering of this verse would be — " Pure have been her 
Nazarites above snow, white above milk, ruddy in body above corals, (like) 
sapphire (has been) their form." The Lxx., Codex B, gives ekathariotheesan 
Naziraioi autees huper chiona, elampsan huper gala, epurotheesan, huper lithou 
sappheirou to apospasma auton : ' her Nazarites were purer than snow, they shone 
above milk, they were purified (as) by fire, beyond a sapphire stone was their 
polish.' Codex A has elampsan, huper gala eturotheesetai htiper lithous sappheirou, 
' they shone, they were coagulated (made like cheese) above milk, above stones of 
sapphire was their polishing.' The V. has candidiores Nazarei ejus nive, nitidiores 
lacte, rubicundiores ebore antiquo, sapphiro piclchriores, ' whiter (were) her Nazarites 
above snow, more shining than milk, ruddier than old ivory, more beautiful than 
the sapphire.' The Syriac reads, ' her Nazarites were purer than snow, and whiter 
than milk in their pastures ; their bones were brighter than the sardine, and their 
body than the sapphire.' The Arabic follows the Lxx., but renders the last 
clause, 'their form (== aspect) was more excellent than a (well-cut) sapphire stone.' 
The T. of Jonathan reads, ' her Nazarites were whiter than snow, smoother than 
milk, ruddier in their appearance than flame-colored stones (or metals), and their 
countenance as the sapphire.' The Hebrew penninim has been variously under- 
stood, taking the sense of 'stone' or 'stones' in the Lxx., 'admirable things' 
(periblepta) in the version of Symmachus, 'old ivory' in the V., 'flame-colored 
things' in the T., 'rubies' in the A. V., and 'corals' as suggested by Gesenius 
and adopted in our rendering. Whatever object was denoted must have been of 
a bright red color, or there would have been no force in the comparison that the 
Nazarites were ' ruddier ' even than it. 



This glowing description of the Nazarites is a testimony, as unimpeachable as it„ 
is splendid, to the physical advantages of abstinence from all intoxicating liquors ; 
and the light emanating from this one text should have been sufficient to 
prevent the darkness of error as to the nature of strong drink from ever 
settling down upon the mind of Christendom. Every touch in this picture 
heightens the effect of the whole as a delineation of perfect health and vigor ; the 
bright blood mantling through a clear complexion, and the whole frame beaming 



204 LAMENTATIONS, IV. 21. 

and glowing, in lines of beauty, like a precious stone. Dr A. Clarke, who follows 
Dr Blayney in rendering gizrahtham 'their veining' (instead of 'their polishing,' 
as in A. V.), remarks upon this metaphorical description: — "Milk will most 
certainly well apply to the whiteness of the skin ; the beautiful ruby to the ruddiness 
of the flesh ; and the sapphire, in its clear transcendent purple, to the veins in a fine 
complexion." It is not pretended that abstinence alone will bring about this 
corporeal appearance, but the Nazarites were a race typical of the physical qualities 
to which such temperance always predisposes, and which it will help to produce 
when associated with a judicious regimen, actively persevered in. It is frequently 
affected to be despised as 'a mere negative,' but when we remember that it is a 
complete negative and nullifier of the most common and fashionable source of all 
kinds and all degrees of disease, mental and bodily, — a negative upon a liquid which 
fosters general debility by tainting the blood and irritating the nervous system, — it 
may be truthfully regarded as no inconsiderable friend to human health and length 
of days. Universally adopted, it would elevate the sanitary level of society, and 
lower the rate of mortality, in excluding a noxious element, by which the one is 
seriously depressed and the other correspondingly raised. It was the surest sign of 
the havoc produced by the desolation of Judah, that the Nazarites, who had been 
so prominent for their healthy and handsome appearance, should become dark, 
haggard, and shriveled through hunger and thirst. Historically, this notice of the 
Nazarites is valuable as showing that Nazaritism, as an institution, continued to 
flourish down to the period of the captivity (b. c. 588). 



Chapter IV. Verse 21. 

Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the 
land of Uz ; the cup also shall pass through unto thee : thou shalt be 
drunken, and shalt make thyself naked. 

$* 

Thou shalt be drunken, and shalt make thyself naked] Hebrew, 
tishekeri ve-thithahri, 'thou shalt be drunken, and shalt uncover thyself '; Lxx., 
methustheesee kaiapocheeis, 'thou shalt be drunken and cast down '; V., inebriaberis 
atque nudaberis, 'thou shalt be made drunk and nude.' 



What in a sober state is concealed, from modesty or prudence, is, in a state of 
inebriation, made bare, and the very power of maintaining propriety or self- 
protection is taken away. Edom, which had rejoiced over Judah' s downfall, 
should drink of the same cup of calamity, and be despoiled by the enemy, like a 
drunken man stripped by the robber who had stricken him down. 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET EZEKIEL. 



[EZEKIEL IS BELIEVED TO HAVE PROPHESIED B. C. 595 — 574.] 



Chapter VIII. Verse 17. 
Then he said unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man ? Is it 
a light thing to the house of Judah that they commit the abomina- 
tions which they commit here? for they have rilled the land with 
violence, and have returned to provoke me to anger: and, lo, they 
put the branch to their nose. 



The branch] Hebrew, haz-zemorah, 'the branch' or 'vine-branch.' [See 
Note on Numb. xiii. 23; Isa. xvii. 10.] Gesenius thinks the reference is "to the 
Persian custom of worshipping the rising sun, holding in their left hand a bundle 
of the twigs of the plant called Barsom." 



Chapter XII. Verses 18, 19. 
18 Son of man, eat thy bread with quaking, and drink thy water 
with trembling and with carefulness ; 19 And say unto the people of 
the land, Thus saith the Lord God, of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, 
and of the land of Israel ; They shall eat their bread with carefulness, 
and drink their water with astonishment, that her land may be 
desolate from all that is therein, because of the violence of all them 
that dwell therein. 



Bread and water are here conjoined as the staple means of sustenance, and for 
these to be consumed with fear and trembling would be a sign of the devastation 
and insecurity about to befall the once prosperous and happy land. 



Chapter XV. Verses 2, 6. 
2 Son of man, What is the vine tree more than any tree, or than a 
branch which is among the trees of the forest ? . . . 6 Therefore 
thus saith the Lord God ; As the vine tree among the trees of the 
forest, which I have given to the fire for fuel, so will I give the in- 
habitants of Jerusalem. 

V. 2, 6. The vine tree] Hebrew, atz hag-gephen, 'a tree of the vine.' 
V. 2. A branch] Hebrew, haz-zemorah, 'the branch' = vine-branch. 



206 EZEKIEL, XXIII. 3 1 — 34. 

The vine is chiefly valuable for its fruit, not for its wood, which is used as fuel 
only. God here declares, therefore, that Jerusalem, having ceased to be a fruitful 
vine, was now fit for the burning to which He would consign it. 



Chapter XVII. Verses 6—8. 
6 And it grew, and became a spreading vine of low stature, whose 
branches turned toward him, and the roots thereof were under him : 
so it became a vine, and brought forth branches, and shot forth 
sprigs. 7 There was also another great eagle with great wings and 
many feathers : and, behold, this vine did bend her roots toward him, 
and shot forth her branches toward him, that he might water it by the 
furrows of her plantation. 8 It was planted in a good soil by great 
waters, that it might bring forth branches, and that it might bear 
fruit, that it might be a goodly vine. 



V. 6, 7. Vine] Hebrew, gephen. 

V. 8. A goodly VINE] Hebrew, gephen ad-dahreth, * a vine ample ' ( = wide- 
spreading). For 'goodly' the Lxx. has megaleen, the V. grandem, 'great.' 



Chapter XIX. Verse 10. 
Thy mother is like a vine in thy blood, planted by the waters : she 
was fruitful and full of branches by reason of many waters. 



Like a vine in thy blood] Hebrew, kag-gephen be-dahmkah, 'as a vine in 
thy blood.' The obscurity of this passage has caused some learned commentators 
to give to dakm the signification of likeness, — 'thy mother is as a vine in thy 
likeness ' = like thee. Calmet conjectures the true reading to be kag-gephen 
karmekah, 'as a vine of thy vineyard.' This is not improbable, since b in Hebrew 
resembles k, and d resembles r; but it is not a conjecture supported by any ancient 
version, and only by two known Hebrew MSS. The Lxx. has 'thy mother (is) 
as a vine, as a flower in a pomegranate.' So'the Arabic. The T. of Jonathan has 
' Israel was like a vine planted near fountains of waters.' Henderson, following 
Piscator and Havernick, reads, 'in thy quietude' — from dum, 'to be quiet, 
— understanding a reference to , the quiet and prosperous times of the Jewish 
monarchy. 



Chapter XXIII. Verses 31 — 34. 
31 Thou hast walked in the way of thy sister; therefore will I give 
her cup into thine hand. 32 Thus saith the Lord God; Thou shalt 
drink of thy sister's cup deep and large : thou shalt be laughed to 
scorn and had in derision; it containeth much. 33 Thou shalt be 
filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of astonishment and 
desolation, with the cup of thy sister Samaria. 34 Thou shalt even 
drink it and suck it out, and thou shalt break the sherds thereof, and 
pluck oft" thine own breasts : for I have spoken it, saith the Lord 
God. 



EZEKIEL, XXIII. 42. 207 

V. 33. Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow] Hebrew, 
shikkahron ve-yahgon timmalai, 'drunkenness and sorrow shall fill thee.' 

With the cup of astonishment and desolation] Hebrew, kos shammah 
ushemahmah, ' the cup of desolation and astonishment.' These two nouns have 
substantially the same meaning, but if an objective and a subjective sense are to be 
given them, it is more natural to take first the literal objective sense of 'wasting' 
or ' desolation,' and then the subjective sense of ' astonishment ' as the result of the 
desolation beheld. 

V. 34. Thou shalt even drink it and suck it out] Literally, 'thou 
shalt drink it and suck it up.' [See Notes on Psa. lxxv. 8, and Isa. li. 17.] The 
Lxx., "Drink thy sister's cup, a deep and broad one [Codex A adds, 'it shall be 
for laughter and for scorn '], and filled to the brim, to cause complete drunkenness 
(metheen), and thou shalt be filled with exhaustion ; and the cup of destruction, the 
cup of thy sister Samaria, drink thou it ! " The V., " Thou shalt drink thy sister's 
cup, deep and broad, with derision and scorn — them who are most capacious. 
Thou shalt be filled with drunkenness and sorrow, with the cup of grief and sadness, 
with the cup of thy sister Samaria ; and thou shalt drink it, and shalt drink it up 
even to the dregs, and the fragments of it thou shalt devour" — alluding, say the 
Douay editors, to the fact that drunkards sometimes bite their cups in their rage. 



Samaria, the kingdom of Israel, had been punished by sword, famine, and 
captivity, and such a cup of misery was now to be given to Judah, who would be 
compelled to drain it as her sister kingdom had done before. Surely the ingredients 
of such a cup are not identical, as one and the same kind of wine, with the contents 
of a 'cup of blessing' ! 

Chapter XXIII. Verse 42. 

And a voice of a multitude being at ease was with her : and with 
the men of the common sort were brought Sabeans from the wilder- 
ness, which put bracelets upon their hands, and beautiful crowns 
upon their heads. 

This verse, as it stands in the A. V., is not free from difficulty, and much un- 
certainty rests upon the meaning of the clause — ' and with the men of the common 
sort were brought Sabeans from the wilderness.' For 'the common sort' the 
margin gives 'multitude of men,' and for 'Sabeans ' it has 'or, drunkards.' The 
word 'Sabeans' has particularly perplexed copyists and translators. The first 
three Hebrew letters are s v b, and the Masorite pointing gives the whole word the 
pronunciation of sahv-vah-im ; but the Masorite doctors, not satisfied with the word 
as thus pointed, suggested a correction which would make the initial letters s b 
(and not s v b), and so permit the word to be taken as sobaim or sovaim, as if 
derived from sak-vah, 'to tipple,' 'to drink to excess.' Sahv-vah-im yields no 
intelligible sense unless taken as a proper name — Sabeans ; yet who were these 
Sabeans? Not those mentioned by Isaiah, xlv. 14, for they were a people of 
Ethiopia, whose name is without a v ; and not the Arabian Sabeans, a name of 
which the initial letter is sh, not s. If the Masorite correction be accepted, reading 
sovaim or sobaim, we arrive at the sense of 'soakers,' 'tipplers,' or 'bacchanals,' 
which agrees very well with the context. On reference, however, to the ancient 
versions, fresh difficulties start up. Codex B of the Lxx. has no equivalent for 
'brought,' and reads, heekontas ek tees eremou, 'coming out of the desert' ; and the 



208 EZEKIEL, XXVII. 1 8. 

V., which has adducebantur, 'were brought,' agrees with Codex B in the next 
clause, et veniebant de deserto, 'and they were coming from the desert.' Lxx., 
Codex A, however, has oinomenous, 'winebibbers from the desert.' We may 
conclude that the MSS. followed by the Vulgate read v b ^ y m, and not 
s v b ^ y my in which case v would be taken for ' and,' and b ^ y m (boim) for 
'coming.' It follows, then, that the present initial s was either dropped from 
those MSS. by mistake, or it was added by mistake to the other MSS. that give 
the received reading s v b ^ y m. The Masorite doctors propose to retain the s 
and drop the v, while the Vulgate keeps the v and drops the s. We can, perhaps, 
more easily account for the erroneous addition of the s than of the v. The final 
letter of the previous word is m, and when m is the final letter (unelongated) of a 
Hebrew word, it very closely resembles s. A copyist might repeat this final m by 
mistake, and the next transcriber, seeing it made no sense, might conclude that it 
was an error for s, and accordingly put s in his copy, joining it to the next v, thus 
changing v b ^ y m {ve-boim = ' and those coming ') into sav-bakim, or sahv-bah-im 
as we now have it. Such an error creeping into a MS. of credit would vitiate all 
subsequent transcripts, while the transcripts made from correct copies would, of 
course, continue to represent the other reading. On the other hand, this resemblance 
between final m and s might lead to the omission of the s by a copyist, and have 
thus originated the reading of ve-boim followed by the Vulgate ; but the fact that no 
one can give any intelligible sense to sahv-bah-im is in favor of the Vulgate, unless 
we carry out the rule that the most difficult reading is always to be preferred. The 
difference between Codices A and B is a proof that the Hebrew MSS. varied as 
far back, at least, as the second century of our era. Dr Henderson gives — "And 
there was the noise of a careless multitude in her, and to men of the common sort 
drunkards were brought from the desert ; and they put bracelets on their hands, 
and a splendid crown upon their heads." 



Aholah (Samaria) and Aholibah (Judah) are represented as lewd women who 
send for their lovers to a distance ; and the prophet represents a miscellaneous 
company as coming up from the wilderness (or, as it may be rendered, ' the plain,' 
or ' pastures ' = the open country), many of whom are attired after the manner of 
revelers, and all ready to indulge in any intemperance or other excess that may 
be proposed. This seems to be an account of an idolatrous festival, perhaps that 
of Bacchus, in which a riotous and drunken multitude assembled, adorned with 
bracelets and chaplets, accompanied with music, songs, and dances. [See Note on 
Amos vi. 4 — 6. ] 



Chapter XXVII. Verse i8. 

Damascus was thy merchant in the multitude of the wares of thy 
making, for the multitude of all riches; in the wine of Helbon, and 
white wool. 

In the wine of Helbon] Hebrew, be-yayn Khelbon, ' with wine of Helbon ' ; 
Lxx., oinos ek C helbon y Symmachus, oinos liparos, ' thick (fat) wine '; so the V., 
in vino pingui, 'with fat (rich) wine,' — taking khelbon not as a proper name, but 
as an adjective noun = 'wine of fatness.' The Syriac rendering is the same. 
The T. of Jonathan has bakhamar khailath mevashal, 'with rich wine boiled.' 
According to Strabo, the wine of Helbon had so great a reputation that it was 
exported for the use of the kings of Persia. Helbon, which still exists under the 



EZEKIEL, XLIV. 21. 209 

name of Haleb or Aleppo, though almost destroyed by an earthquake in 1822, is 
not to be confounded with the more celebrated Aleppo of Asia Minor. Under the 
names of Chalybon and Chalybonium vinum the wine of Helbon was known to the 
Greeks and Romans, but unless it had been an inspissated wine, thick as treacle 
or honey, its transportation could not have been easily effected, certainly not with- 
out a great risk of spoiling a fermented wine. Possibly the name was extensively 
given to some imitations prepared for the European market. 



Chapter XXVIII. Verse 26. 
And they shall dwell safely therein, and shall build houses, and 
plant vineyards. 



Vineyards] Hebrew, kerahmim. 



Chapter XXXIX. Verse 19. 
And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be 
drunken, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you. 



And drink blood till ye be drunken] Hebrew, ushthithem Bahm le- 
shikkaron, ' and ye have drunk ( = shall drink) blood to drunkenness ' == to 
repletion ; the sense being that of gorging, to correspond with the first clause of 
the sentence. 

Chapter XLIV. Verse 21. 
Neither shall any priest drink wine, when they enter into the inner 
court. 



Wine] Hebrew, yayin ; Lxx., oinon ; V., vinum. 

Ezekiel, in ver. 17 — 19, refers to the 'linen garments' of the priests when 
ministering in the inner court; and as the use of linen was designed to insure a 
cleanliness symbolical of inward purity, the prohibition of wine was obviously a real 
means to that great moral end. Josephus (Antiq., b. iii., c. 12, s. 2) recognizes 
this connection : — " Moses enjoined the priests not only to observe purity in their 
sacred administrations, but in their daily conduct, that it may be unblamable also ; 
and on this account it is that those who wear the sacerdotal robe are without spot, and 
concerning all things are pure and abstinent \_kai peri panta katharoi kai neephalioi\ 
being forbidden to drink wine so long as they are wearing this robe [pinein oinon 
heds ou teen stoleen echosi kekolumenoi~\." It was, in fact, equal to saying, ' While 
you are My special servants, wearing My livery, you must do My work on this 
abstinent plan, or perish; there is no other plan of absolute safety and purity.' 

On the phrase 'drink wine,' the Assembly of Westminster divines of 1651, in 
their 'Annotations,' have this comment: — "Occasions of evil to be avoided; 
specially in sacred things — Lev. x. 9; Psa. xciii. 5 — and by sacred ministers. 
They of all men must not be given to wine." Does not the question, then, fairly 
arise, Why not avoid the evil by the adoption of the same plan ? — a plan devised 
and enforced by the All-wise in regard to His own servants, engaged in His own 
special work ? Are men wiser than God ? 



This republication of the Levitical law £Lev. x. 9) is worthy of the careful 
attention of those who look upon the prophecies of Ezekiel as typical of the 

27 



210 EZEKIEL, XLV. 1 7, 21. 

dispensation under which all believers are 'kings and priests unto God.' It 
cannot be without significance now, that during their most solemn official duties 
abstinence was enjoined upon the ancient priests. Christianity does not sanction 
the abolition of safeguards against evil, but renders their adoption more pleasing to 
God, because inspired by filial reverence and godly fear. Philo, who was con- 
temporary with the apostles, shows, in his treatise on Monarchy, that he had 
entered into the moral and catholic spirit of the Levitical ordinance. The passage 
is very striking, and is as follows: — "God issues additional commandments, and 
orders Aaron, whenever he approaches the altar and touches the sacrifices at the 
time when it is appointed for him to perform his sacred ministrations, not to drink 
wine or any other strong drink, on account of four most important reasons — 
hesitation, and forgetfulness, and sleep, and folly. For the intemperate man 
[akrafoSy which Dr Mangey refers not to the drinker but to the drink — unmixed 
wine, — a sense which the passage will well bear] relaxes the powers of his frame and 
renders his limbs more slow of motion, and makes his whole body more inclined to 
hesitation, and compels it by force to become drowsy. And he [or it] also relaxes 
the energies of his soul, and so becomes the cause to it of forgetfulness and folly. 
But in the case of abstemious men (neephonton) all the parts of the body are lighter, 
and, as such, more active and movable, and the outer senses are more pure and 
unalloyed, and the mind is gifted with a more acute sight, so that it is able to see 
things beforehand, and never forgets what it has previously seen. In a word, 
indeed, it must be considered that the use of wine is most unprofitable to the soul 
for all the purposes of life (sunolds, men oun teen oinou chreesin pasi tois kata ton 
bion alusiteleotateen einai upoleepteon psuchees), inasmuch as by it the soul is 
weighed down, the outward senses are dimmed, and the body is enervated. For it 
does not leave any one of our faculties free and unembarrassed, but is a hindrance 
to every one of them, so as to impede its attaining that object to which it is by nature 
fitted. But in sacred ceremonies and holy rites this mischief is most grievous of all, 
in proportion as it is worse and more intolerable to sin with respect to God than 
with respect to man, on which account it probably is, that it is commanded to the 
priests to offer sacrifices without wine (neephaiia), in order to make a difference 
and distinction between sacred and profane things, and pure and impure things, 
and lawful and unlawful things." 



Chapter XLV. Verse 17. 
And it shall be the prince's part to give burnt offerings, and meat 
offerings, and drink offerings, in the feasts, and in the new moons, 
and in the sabbaths, in all solemnities of the house of Israel : he 
shall prepare the sin offering, and the meat offering, and the burnt 
offering, and the peace offerings, to make reconciliation for the house 
of Israel. 



And drink offerings] Hebrew, ve-kan-nasek, 'and the libation.' 



Chapter XLV. Verse 21. 
In the first month, in the fourteenth day of the month, ye shall have 
the passover, a feast of seven days ; unleavened bread shall be eaten. 

Unleavened bread shall be eaten] Hebrew, matzotk yaahkal, 'unfermented 
(things) shall be eaten.' Matzotk here is taken as a collective noun, and joined to 
a singular verb. It means 'fresh, sweet things.' 



THE BOOK OF DANIEL. 



Chapter I. Verse 5. 

And the king appointed them a daily provision of the king's meat, 
and of the wine which he drank : so nourishing them three years, that 
at the end thereof they might stand before the king. 



Of the king's meat] Hebrew, mip-pathbag ham-melek, * from the food of the 
king.' Gesenius gives to pathbag the force of ' delicate food,' 'dainties,' and refers 
it to a Persian origin. Lxx., apo tees trapezees tou basileos, ' from the table of the 
king.' V., de cibis suis, 'from his victuals.' 

And of the wine which he drank] Hebrew, umiy-yayin mishtahv, ' and 
from the wine of his drinking.' Lxx., kai apo tou oinou tou potou autou, 'and 
from the wine of his own drinking.' V., et de vino unde bibebat ipse, 'and from 
the wine whence he himself drank. ' 



Under Nebuchadnezzar the Babylonian empire attained its greatest expansion 
and glory ; but being founded on mere military supremacy, its decay was as rapid 
as its rise. Luxury enervated the Babylonian princes and nobles during times of 
peace ; and while their food was dainty, their drinks were chosen with the view 
rather of exciting thirst than of allaying it. 



Chapter I. Verse 8. 



But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself 
with the portion of the king's meat, nor with the wine which he 
drank : therefore he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he 
might not defile himself. 



With the wine which he drank] Hebrew, bb-yayin mishtahv, 'with the 
wine of his (the king's) drinking.' 



Daniel's scruples may have arisen from his knowledge of idolatrous rites used 
in connection with the king's provisions, — perhaps their formal dedication to Bel 
before they were served up for the royal table. 



Chapter I. Verse 10. 



And the prince of the eunuchs said unto Daniel, I fear my lord the 
king, who hath appointed your meat and your drink : for why should. 



212 DANIEL, I. II — 16. 

he see your faces worse liking than the children which are of your 
sort ? then shall ye make me endanger my head to the king. 

Your faces worse liking] Hebrew, penaikem zoaphim, 'your faces sad.' 
Zoaphim is rendered by the Lxx. skuthrdpa, 'melancholy-looking'; by the V., 
macilentiores, 'leaner.' 



The prince of the eunuchs reasoned correctly from a right premiss — that the 
best diet will produce the best effect upon the countenance ; but his minor premiss 
being fallacious — that the king's diet was the best — his conclusion is at fault. 
He mistook, as many still do, less excusable after Daniel's refutation of the error, 
luxurious for strengthening fare, and highly flavored for nourishing food. 



Chapter I. Verses ii — 16. 
ii Then said Daniel to Melzar, whom the prince of the eunuchs 
had set over Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, 12 Prove thy 
servants, I beseech thee, ten days ; and let them give us pulse to eat, 
and water to drink. 13 Then let our countenances be looked upon 
before thee, and the countenance of the children that eat of the 
portion of the king's meat : and as thou seest, deal with thy servants. 

14 So he consented to them in this matter, and proved them ten days. 

15 And at the end of ten days their countenances appeared fairer and 
fatter in flesh than all the children which did eat the portion of the 
king's meat. 16 Thus Melzar took away the portion of their meat, 
and the wine that they should drink ; and gave them pulse. 



V. 11. To Melzar] Hebrew, el-kam-meltzar, 'tothemeltzar.' The Lxx. reads, 
Amelsad ; the V., Malasar. Some critics regard meltzamot as a proper name, 
but as the designation of an office. 

V. 12. Pulse] Hebrew, haz-zaroim. The verb zahra signifies ' to sow,' and 
zaroi?n may be taken comprehensively as including grain, herbs, and roots. Lxx., 
ton spermaton, ' of seeds ' ; Codex A adds tees gees, ' of the earth ' ; V., legumina, 
'pulse.' 

V. 15. Their countenances appeared fairer and fatter] Hebrew, 
nirah maraihem tov uveriai bahsar min-kol-hailahdim, 'their countenances 
appeared good, and they were fat in flesh above all the (royal) offspring. ' 
Lxx. has ' their countenances appeared agathai kai ischurai tais sarxin — good 
and firm in flesh;' but Codex A has 'their countenances appeared good, and they 
were firm in flesh' — i. e. all over their body. V., apparuerunt vultus eorum 
tneliores et corpulentiores, ' their faces appeared better and fatter.' 

The prince of the eunuchs having dismissed his plea, Daniel applied, on behalf 
of himself and his young friends, to Meltzar — or some subordinate officer designated 
'the meltzar,' — and proposed an experiment, which that officer had the good sense 
to sanction. The period granted, ten days, afforded a reasonable time for solving 
the question; and it was solved, not more to Daniel's satisfaction than to the officer's 
surprise. Instead of looking upon lean and melancholy countenances, he saw four 
pleasant faces with fat and full-rounded cheeks. Having made out so good a case, 
the Hebrew youths were permitted to continue the dietary for which they had 
petitioned. Several circumstances call for special notice in this experiment. 



DANIEL, I. II — 1 6. 2 13 

1. The wisdom of Daniel. He had observed that all physical nutriment comes 
primarily from the produce of the soil, and was not confined to dainty dishes or 
flesh of animals. Equally discerning was he as to the compatibility of good health 
without wine of any kind, whether fresh or fermented. The nutritious elements 
of grape-juice existed, he well knew (as all might know by a little reflection), in 
other substances, and he was not the slave of the miserable modern superstition, 
alike deceitful and destructive, which assigns to the process of fermentation the 
production of some peculiar element of vitality and vigor. From the example of 
the Nazarites, if not himself one of that noble band of Jewish abstainers, he was 
well assured that the wine which Solomon had called ' a mocker ' was no necessary 
ingredient of a wholesome and nutritious diet. 

2. Not less notable was the moral courage of the young Hebrew exile. He 
dared to run counter even to court prejudice and fashion. He scorned scorn 
where conscience was concerned. Anticipating an apostolic maxim, his example 
virtually said, In things evil be not conformed to the court. 

3. The enlightened spirit of Meltzar, too, calls for eulogy. He did not doggedly 
set himself against change, and exclude the light of evidence. He did not say, 
"Daniel must be wrong because the king thinks differently, and venerable 
Babylonish usage is all the other way;" nor did he use the powers of his office 
tyrannically, by refusing liberty to his charge in a matter relating to their own 
comfort and convictions. Some portion of his spirit infused into many British 
minds would incline them to undertake that personal trial of abstinence for them- 
selves which Daniel desired leave for himself and his companions to carry out. 
Some, indeed, who do enter upon this trial, begin with misgivings or longings 
fitted to insure its failure, while the blame is absurdly cast upon the principle that 
has been unfairly tried and treated. ' Ten days ' were allowed to Daniel, while 
some who can choose their own period of experiment shorten it to half the time ; 
and cases are not unknown where ' ten hours ' have been thought long enough to 
try it as against 'the other side,' which has been practised for half a lifetime. 
Experiments of this order prove nothing but the insincerity or trifling disposition 
of those who enter upon them. 

4. Daniel and his friends' success is at once an example, an argument, and an 
encouragement. It was a visible success — written on the faces of Daniel and his 
friends ; not an exceptional triumph, a lucky chance, but a result in accordance 
with Divine natural law, and therefore one capable of being repeated and con- 
firmed by experience in all ages and civil communities. The success of the experi- 
ment demonstrates that the use of luxurious fare and intoxicating drinks is not 
compatible with the utmost perfection of body and brain ; while it allows entire 
liberty as to particular kinds of food, practically found to be best adapted to 
nourish the body or gratify an unvitiated taste. The statement of Daniel (x. 3), 
that he had abstained for a season from wine, and the implication that he after- 
ward resumed its use, do not in the least qualify the great conclusion of this 
narrative; even assuming, gratuitously [see Prel. Dis.], that the 'wine' in each 
case was similar as to intoxicating quality. To assume that Daniel, late in life, used 
the wine from which he so advantageously abstained in his youth, cannot get rid 
of results ; nor, therefore, weaken the natural demonstration thus afforded, that 
abstinence insured (as a negative condition) the most robust health, and even a 
measure of health superior to that evidenced by those who (in the face of the fact) 
continued their allotted portion of the king's meat and wine, — a class assuredly 
not without descendants unto this day. 



214 DANIEL, V. I — 4, 30. 

Chapter V. Verses i — 4, 30. 
% Belshazzar the king made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, 
and drank wine before the thousand. 2 Belshazzar, while he tasted 
the wine, commanded to bring the golden and silver vessels which his 
father Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple which was in 
Jerusalem; that the king, and his princes, his wives, and his 
concubines, might drink therein. 3 Then they brought the golden 
vessels that were taken out of the temple of the house of God which 
was at Jerusalem ; and the king, and his princes, his wives, and his 
concubines, drank in them. 4 They drank wine, and praised the 
gods of gold, and of silver, of brass, of iron, of wood, and of stone. 
30 In that night was Belshazzar king of the Chaldeans slain. 



V. 1. A great feast] Chaldee, lekhem rav, ' a feast, a great (one).' Lekhem 
is the Chaldee for 'food,' and thence is used to represent a large supply of food, a 
banquet. Lxx., deipnon mega, 'a great feast.' (The Greek deipnon answered to 
the modern fashionable 'dinner,' both as forming the principal meal of the day, 
and as being served up in the evening.) V., grande convivhmi, 'a great feast.' 

And drank wine] Chaldee, ve-lah-qahval alpah khamrah shahtha, 'and to 
(or before) a thousand he drank wine. ' The Chaldee kha?nrah corresponds to the 
Hebrew khemer, but its primitive sense of ' foaming ' had merged into a new and 
pregnant significance, from the practice of adding to the juice of the grape an 
artificial form and depth of color, the outward sign of qualities holding 'fierce 
enmity with the blood of man,' yet capable of exercising a fatal witchery over his 
nervous system. As the king drank, so did his nobles. The Lxx. has ' and over 
against the thousand, wine.' The V. has ' and he drank to every one according to 
his age ' — i. <?. he toasted the principal guests. 

V. 2. Belshazzar, while he tasted the wine, commanded] Chaldee, 
Behhatzar a?nar bitam khamrah, ' Belshazzar ordered, in the taste of wine ' = 
whilst drinking wine, he ordered, etc. Yet more than simple tasting is probably 
designed by bitam khamrah ; for as team, from the original sense of ' tasting ' or 
' flavor,' acquired the secondary meanings of 'knowledge,' 'decree,' 'command,' 
the clause might not be improperly translated ' Belshazzar ordered, by (or under) 
the influence (or inspiration) of wine,' etc. Dr Gill's note is, "As he was drink- 
ing his cups, and delighted with the taste of the wine, and got merry with it ; or, 
'by the advice of the wine,' as Aben Ezra and Jarchi interpret it, as if that 
dictated to him and put him upon doing what follows ; and which often puts both 
foolish and wicked things into the heads of men, and upon doing them." Lxx., 
kai peinon Baltasar eipen en tee geusei ton oinou, 'and Belshazzar drinking, said, 
in the taste of the wine.' The edition of the Lxx. preserved by Origen reads, 
ennpsoumenos apo ton oinou, 'lifted up by the wine.' The V. is abrupt and 
expressive, — pracepit ergo jam temulentus, ' he commanded, therefore, being now 
intoxicated.' Any reverence he might have felt for the sacred vessels of the 
Jewish temple vanished as soon as the wine had done its work of disturbance in 
the brain. 



The feast was such as might be expected to take place under the presidency of 
an absolute king, pampered and dissolute, and wishing to vaunt of his security, 



DANIEL, X. 3. 215 



while his kingdom was in fact departing from him. This dissipation was the 
natural, but not less providential antecedent of the catastrophe sketched in the 
words, 'In that night was Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans slain.' Accord- 
ing to Xenophon, in his 'Cyropsedia' (vii. 5, 15), all Babylon was given up to 
revelry while celebrating one of the great festivals of Bel ; and taking advantage 
of this dissipation, Cyrus captured the city, and the king was slain. According to 
Herodotus, the gates opening toward the river Euphrates having been left open 
and unguarded, owing to the inebriety of the soldiers, the Persian prince (whose 
refusal as a boy to taste wine because it had poison in it, is one of the stories one 
wishes to believe) had no difficulty in entering with the troops he had marched 
down the river's bed, after drawing off its waters into an artificial channel. The 
name of the king who thus ingloriously fell was given by Berosus as Nabonnedus, 
or Nabonadius ; Nabonnidochus, by Megasthenes ; and Labynetus,* by Herodotus. 
And this discrepancy of nomenclature between the Scripture and secular historians 
had not been left unused to discredit the narrative of the former. But Sir H. 
Rawlinson deciphered, in 1854, some cylinders found in the ancient Ur of the 
Chaldees, which testified that the eldest son of Nabonnedus was called Bel-shar- 
ezar, and was admitted to a share in the government. "And we can now under- 
stand," writes Rawlinson, "how Belshazzar, as joint-king with his father, may 
have been governor of Babylon when the city was attacked by the combined forces 
of the Medes and Persians, and may have perished in the assault which followed ; 
while Nabonnedus, leading a force to the relief of the place, was defeated and. 
obliged to take refuge in Borsippa, capitulating after a short resistance, and being 
subsequently assigned, according to Berosus, an honorable retirement in Carma- 
nia." If this theory is correct, Belshazzar was slain B. c. 538 ; but if that of Niebuhr 
be entertained, which makes Belshazzar identical with Evil-merodach, the son of 
Nebuchadnezzar, and a first capture of Babylon to have happened under Astyages 
(= Darius) the Mede, his death must be placed twenty-one years earlier, B. c. 559. 



It may be fitly asked, why so many modern critics refuse to treat the difficulties 
of the wine question as they do others, — as, for example, the one just discussed ? 
Here they not only do not object to suppose facts that might remove a discrepancy, 
but search for such facts, and hail their discovery with delight. But while in the 
case of the governor of Babylon they are willing to accept two kings at once, they 
as positively refuse to discriminate the quality of wines, which, they tenaciously 
affirm, are but of one kind, and that of which the words are uttered, 'Wine is a 
mocker.' 



Chapter X. Verse 3. 

I ate no pleasant bread, neither came flesh nor wine in my mouth, 
neither did I anoint myself at all, till three whole weeks were fulfilled. 



Wine] Hebrew, yayin. Daniel does not use the Hebrew word khemer, which 
might have indicated a liquor analogous to the Chaldee khamrah, drunk by 
Belshazzar and his lords, but he uses the generic name for the juice of the grape 
in all its expressed forms. In the absence of information, no one has a right to 
decide that Daniel, in his old age, habitually consumed the kind of yayin which 

* These three names are the same ; in the last, L is substituted for N. 



2l6 DANIEL, X. 3. 



the royal Preacher had designated * a mocker,' and which the older prophets of 
his nation had employed as a symbol of Divine retribution. Innocent preparations 
of yayin could be procured in abundance. The question, what kind of wine 
Daniel drank, is to be answered, so far as an answer is possible, by the proba- 
bilities of the case. That somebody consumed innocent vinous preparations is 
certain: is it probable that the prophets and saints were the sole persons who 
refused to do so ? Is it likely that, while moral pagans preferred good wines, the 
prophets and religious Jews invariably selected the drugged and intoxicating? 
But the associated element of Daniel's abstinence will refute the whole principle of 
the argument. He abstained from ' flesh. ' Does this imply, because the term is 
generic, that, before and after his temporary abstinence from all animal food, he 
consumed pork and every other ordinary form of flesh ? If there was discrimina- 
tion in the case of the meat, why not in the case of the wine ? If, behind the 
general formula, we have to place many guiding principles of limitation in regard 
to 'flesh,' universally a satisfier, is it not equally rational to do so in respect of 
' wine,' of which one kind at least is said to be a deceiver and a poison ? Whatever 
answer is returned can in no degree affect the general argument for abstinence 
based on Science and Experience, nor the particular argument deduced from the 
signal success of the abstinent practice which, in his youth, Daniel so firmly adopted 
and so consistently pursued. 



THE 

BOOK OF THE PROPHET HOSEA. 



[HOSEA FLOURISHED ABOUT THE YEAR 750 B. C.] 



Chapter II. Verse 5. 

For their mother hath played the harlot : she that conceived them 
hath done shamefully : for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give 
me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, mine oil and my 
drink. 



And my drink] Hebrew, ve-shiqquyahi, 'and my drinks'; Lxx., kai panta 
hosa ?noi katheekei, ' and all things which it befits me (to have). ' So the Syriac 
and Arabic. V., et potum meum, 'and my drink.' But the Aldine edition of 
the Lxx. has ho oinos mou, ' my wine ' ; the T. of Jonathan, ' and all my 
sustenance.' These 'drinks' were probably aromatic compounds, such as a 
luxurious appetite would delight in. 



Chapter II. Verse 8. 



For she did not know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and 
multiplied her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal. 



Corn, and wine, and oil] Hebrew, had-dahgan, ve-hat-tirosh, ve-hay-yitzhar, 
'the corn, and the vine-fruit, and the orchard- fruit. ' These principal products of 
the soil are here enumerated in the order which they had held in the Jewish 
writings for seven hundred years. Lxx., siton, oinon, elaion ; V., frumentum, 
vinum, oleum; Newcome, ' corn and choice wine ' ; Benisch, ' corn and must.' 



Chapter II. Verse 9. 
Therefore will I return, and take away my corn in the time thereof, 
and my wine in the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my 
flax given to cover her nakedness. 



And my wine in the season thereof] Hebrew, ve-tiroshi be-moado, 'and 
my vine-fruit in its appointed time. ' The corn (dahgan) and tirosh are here both 
represented as being directly created by God, and having their seasons of maturity. 
Stronger evidence could hardly be afforded of their common nature as the solid 
outgrowth of the fertile earth. Lxx., ton oinon mou, V., vinum meum, ' my wine.' 
28 



2l8 HOSEA, III. I. 



That the ancient Jews understood the language of the text in its plain and 
natural sense, and had no idea of giving to it a far-fetched metonymical meaning, 
is evident from the fact preserved to us in the Talmud (treatise 'Berakoth,' 
cap. vi.), where the various blessings of the Hebrews are explained: — "What 
blessing must be said for fruit? For fruit which grows upon a tree, say, Who 
createst the^fruit of the tree — save for Wine, wherein the benediction is, 'Who 
createst the fruit of the vine.' . . . For things that derive not their growth 
immediately from the ground (Psalm civ. 14, 15), say, 'Who gave being to all 
things.' R. Jehudah says no blessing should be pronounced over things that 
had their origin in a corruption or curse." 



Chapter II. Verse 12. 
And I will destroy her vines and her fig trees, whereof she hath 
said, These are my rewards that my lovers have given me : and I will 
make them a forest, and the beasts of the field shall eat them. 



Her vines] Hebrew, gaphenah, 'her vine.' So the Lxx. and V. The T. 
of Jonathan has 'the fruit of her vine.' 



Chapter II. Verse 15. 
And I will give her her vineyards from thence, and the valley of 
Achor for a door of hope : and she shall sing there, as in the days 
of her youth, and as in the day when she came up out of the land of 
Egypt. 



Her vineyards] Hebrew, eth-khameihah, 'her vineyards.' The Lxx. and 
Arabic have 'her possessions ' (ta kteemata) ; the V., 'her vine-dressers ' (vinitores). 
The Syriac agrees with the A. V. 



Chapter II. Verse 22. 
And the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil ; and 
they shall hear Jezreel. 



The triad is here repeated, dahgan, tirosh, yitzhar ; and by an expressive figure, 
the earth, which brings them forth, is described as hearing (listening so as to 
answer) the cry of her offspring for her maternal sustenance. The whole beauty 
and consistency of this metaphor depends upon the supposition that the tiros h and 
yitzhar held the same relation to the earth as the dahgan (corn). Lxx., siton, 
oinon, elaion, ' corn, wine, oil. ' The V. has triticum, vinum, oleum, ' wheat, 
wine, and oil,' — thus further narrowing even the corn to a single species ! 



Chapter III. Verse i. 
Then said the Lord unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her 
friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the 
children of Israel, who look to other gods, and love flagons of wine. 



HOSE A, IV. II. 219 



Flagons of wine] Hebrew, ashishai anahbim, 'pressed cakes of grape- 
clusters.' So Henderson and Benisch. Lxx. , pemmata meta staphidos [Codex A, 
staphidon\, 'cakes (made) with raisins ' ; V., vinacia uvarum, 'husks of grapes.' 
[As to ashishah, see Prel. Dis., and Notes upon 2 Sam. vi. 19; I Chron. xvi. 3; 
Cant. ii. 5«] 

Chapter IV. Verse ii. 
Whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart. 



The Hebrew reads, zenutk, ve-yayin, ve-tirosh, yiqqakh lav, ' fornication, and 
wine, and vine-fruit, captivate the heart.' ~Lxx.,pomeian, kai oinon, kai methusma 
edexato kardia laou mou, ' the heart of my people has taken to fornication, and 
wine, and strong drink ' ; V., fornicatio, et vinum, et ebrietas auferunt cor, 'forni- 
cation, and wine, and drunkenness bear away the heart.' The T. of Jonathan 
reads, khamrah ve-ravyethah, ' wine and satiation (or drunkenness). ' 



The Westminster divines (1651) have a pithy annotation: — "The meaning of 
this verse is, that their abundance makes them run into all riot, in carnal, sinful 
pleasure." Now-a-days this verse is the last resource of those who hold that both 
yayin and tirosh denote the same species of intoxicating wine ; but as the ground 
of this notion is the word yiqqakh (from lah-qakh, to take), nothing is easier than 
to show that the imaginary proof has no philological basis at all. Lah-qakh is 
never once used (unless it be so now for the first time) in the sense of intoxication ; 
why, then, should it be assumed to bear that meaning here ? The reasoning is in 
a vicious circle, thus: — ' Yayin and tirosh are intoxicating articles.' 'Why?' 
' Because they are said to take away, that is, intoxicate the heart. ' ' But why 
should "takeaway" be here suggested to mean intoxication ?' ' Because yayin 
and tirosh were intoxicating drinks ' ! Now, since fornication does not literally 
intoxicate, why should it be necessary to presume intoxicating qualities in yayin 
and tirosh ? Lah-qakh is used with a great variety and range of meaning, as, ' to 
take,' 'to fetch,' 'to lay hold upon,' 'to take away,' 'to occupy,' 'to seize,' 'to 
captivate,' etc. The sense of 'captivate' agrees best with the context of this 
passage, and is similarly applied to the noblest form of human effort (Prov. xi. 30), 
' And he that winneth ( = enchaineth or captivateth) souls is wise. ' Other 
objections lie against the common supposition. It would be absurd to associate the 
generic term ' wine ' with the specific tirosh, as if they were different in the common 
quality of producing ' intoxication ' ! It violates a fundamental law of thought and 
composition to put the weaker element last ; and the critics with whom we are 
now dealing will hardly deny that ' new wine ' (mustum, as they would render 
tirosh) is weaker than ' old wine.' To speak of men being intoxicated with ' beer ' 
and ' new beer ' would be a form of speech not much improved by adding ' old ' to 
the first term. Had the object of the prophet been to state anything about intoxi- 
cation specifically, he would hardly have instanced two articles of the same class, 
differing only in age, still less have asssociated them with a third which had not the 
same quality at all. The force of the objection was clearly felt by the Lxx. and 
the V. translators, who simply evaded it by departing from their original, trans- 
lating tirosh as if it had been shakar ! The key of the passage, however, is in the 
first term, which critics have taken typi-cally, while they foolishly forced upon the 
other two a merely physical sense ! Yayin and tirosh, we conclude, are not neces- 



220 HOSEA, IV. 1 8. 



sarily intoxicating because they 'take away' the heart, or 'lay hold' of the 
affections ; and the simple fact that they are here connected with ' whoredom ' 
might have suggested to the critic that some other reason existed for the triple 
association than a property belonging only to two members of the triad. Nor is 
the line of the prophet's thought difficult to trace, (i) By 'whoredom ' is here to 
be understood, as throughout the prophecy, illicit worship rendered by the chosen 
people to heathen gods. This worship was spiritual fornication, and by it their 
hearts were captivated — literally, ' taken away ' from that exclusive trust and 
allegiance which they owed to God as Jehovah of hosts and their covenant King. 
(2) By yayitiy wine — the type of sensual gratification, — their hearts had also been 
captivated — ' drawn away ' from that supreme affection which they owed to God 
as their Divine Redeemer and Benefactor. (3) By iirosk, the fruit of the vine — 
the type of natural, earthly good, — their hearts had been captivated — ' taken away ' 
from God as the infinite Goodness and the Fountain of spiritual joy. This was 
the threefold apostasy of which the children of Abraham had been guilty ; they 
went after strange gods instead of the true God ; their best affections centered in 
sensual pleasures instead of being fixed upon the Divine love ; and their estimate 
of good was limited to earthly things (represented by tirosh, one of the most 
delicious of natural elements) instead of embracing Him 'from whom all blessings 
flow.' Or, taking the ascending scale, their understanding was darkened, for they 
esteemed temporal good above the eternal Giver of good; their affections were 
sensualized, by being excessively engaged with animal delights ; and their spiritual 
nature was debased, by being prostrated before stupid idols. Intoxication, if at all 
implied, is comprehended under those lusts of the flesh which intoxicating yayin 
aggravates, and to which it adds a new lust unknown to the mere animal creation 
— the lust of alcoholic drink.* 



Chapter IV. Verse 18. 



Their drink is sour : they have committed whoredom continually : 
her rulers with shame do love, Give ye. 



Their drink is sour] Hebrew, sahr sahvahm, 'sour (is) their savea.' [As to 
SOVEH, see Prel. Dis., and Note on Isa. i. 22.] Though a thick boiled and 
luscious drink, soveh was liable to be affected by sudden changes of temperature, 
and to become sour. Columella (lib. xii. cap. 20) says that defrutum {inust boiled 
to one-half its bulk) was accustomed to become acid {solet acescere), however 
carefully made. The Lxx. has the strange reading, 'he has vied with the 
Canaanites.' The V. is 'their feast has been divided.' The T., mistaking the 
pointing perhaps, reads, 'their princes multiply feastings with violence.' Hen- 
derson, who takes sahr in the sense of 'past,' renders, 'when their carousal is 
over ' ; Newcome, 'he is gone after their wine ' ; Benisch, ' their beverage is sour.' 

*Another interpretation may possibly be preferred by some readers. Around idolatry (spiritual 
whoredom) all the sins of Israel collected, and by association with idolatry, even that which was 
intrinsically good was magnetized with the evil, and became a confirmation of it. _ Lasciviousness 
and intemperance, it is certain, were closely and lavishly connected with heathen rites ; and in the 
heathen temples supplications were made for all earthly blessings. Whoredom, therefore, i. e. 
idolatry, took away the hearts of the people ; this was the primary captivity ; but the use of wine 
(especially of an intoxicating kind), by way of ceremonial offering and indulgence at pagan rites, 
still further drew their hearts from God ; and the prayers presented for the increase of their fruits 
—tirosh being named as one of their chief productions— carried them still further away from 
dependence upon the one God of heaven and earth. As to the connection of tirosh with idolatry, 
see Note on chap. vii. 14. 



HOSEA, VII. 4, 5- 221 



Horsley, Ewald, and others, take sahr as ' sour.' Instead of sahvahm one Hebrew 
MS. has sovim, ' drunkards ' ; another sevahim, ' Sabeans ' ; and a third tzevah-ahm, 
'their host.' 



The prophet, in illustrating the fall of Israel into idolatry, uses two striking 
comparisons — the turning sour of so sweet a drink as soveh, and the crime of 
adultery. As far removed as sourness was from sweetness, and fornication from 
marital fidelity, so vast was the difference between idolatry and the service of the 
God of Jacob. 



Chapter VII. Verse 4. 

They are all adulterers, as an oven heated by the baker, who 
ceaseth from raising after he hath kneaded the dough, until it be 
leavened. 



Until it be leavened] Hebrew, ad khumetzahtho, 'until its leavening.' 



Chapter VII. Verse 5. 

In the day of our king the princes have made him sick with bottles 
of wine ; he stretched out his hand with scorners. 



In the day of our king the princes have made him sick with bottles 
of wine] Hebrew, yom malekkanu hekhelu sarim khamath miy-yayin, ' the 
day of our king, the princes made themselves sick (with) the heat of wine.' By 
' the day of the king ' is to be understood his coronation or his birthday — the high 
day or festival day when the event was commemorated. On such a day the princes 
made themselves sick with the khamath, 'heat of wine. It is extraordinary 
that the translators of the A. V., who so often translated the word as 'poison,' 
' heat,' and ' fury,' should have preferred the rendering of ' bottles,' seeing (1) that 
khamath, in the obsolete sense of 'bottle,' occurs in but one early chapter of the 
Old Testament, — Gen. xxi. 14, 15, 19; (2) that the construct or genitive case 
there (in ver. 14) is differently pointed from the pointing of this text ; (3) that the 
noun khamah and the verb khahmam are used repeatedly of the inflaming, poisonous 
influence of wine (Deut. xxxii. 33; Isa. li. 1 7 ; Jer. xxv. 15 ; li. 39); (4) that the 
khamath is clearly assigned as the cause of the sickness ; and (5) that in ver. 7 of 
this very chapter the phrase yakhammu katannitr is translated in A. V. ' they are 
hot sls an oven. The Lxx. has [Codex A, ai~] heemerai ton basileon humon, eerxanto 
oi archontes thumousthai ex oinou, ' (they were) the days of your kings ; the princes 
began to rage with wine'; Syriac, 'in the day of our kings the great men began 
to be infuriated with wine ' ; the V., dies regis nostri; cceperunt principes furere a 
vino, ' (it was) the day of our king, the princes began to be mad from wine.' 
Benisch has 'officers made him sick with fury from wine.' Henderson reads, 
' the princes are sick with the fever of wine ' ; Newcome, ' the princes began to be 
hot with wine.' Both the Lxx. and V. take h-kh-l-ti, not as Hiphil of khah-lah, 
* to smooth,' ' become sick ' or « sad,' but as the Hiphil hakhelu of the verb khah-lal 
«to pierce,' 'open,' 'begin'— 'the princes began ' ; and they also take khahmath 
as an infinitive, ' to be hot ' = to be maddened. These readings supply a very 
good sense j but a still better sense will be obtained if khah-lal is taken in the 



222 HOSEA, IX. 2. 



sense of ' to profane ' or ' pollute,' as it is in Ezek. xxxix. 7, — 'And I will not let 
them pollute My holy name. ' Indeed, if khah-lah is retained, the sickness must 
be considered as moral, and not physical ; so that the same result is arrived at. 

He stretched out his hand with scorners] The Hebrew for scorners 
is lotzetzim, 'those scorning' or 'mocking.' This is the verbal form of the word 
latz which occurs in the celebrated passage, 'Wine is a mocker ' {latz); and no 
wonder that this powerful 'mocker' should place the ruler of Israel among the 
number of mockers, betraying king and courtiers alike into open transgression. 
The Lxx., exeteine teen cheira autoit meta loimon, ' he stretched out his hands with 
pests,' i. e. men who were like pests or plagues; the V., extendit manum suam 
cum illusoribus, 'he stretched out his hand with mockers ' ; the T., 'he drew to 
his own hand a crowd of liars ' ; the Arabic, ' he stretched out his hand with 
corruption '; the Syriac, 'they draw out their hands with the vile.' The passage 
is abrupt, but sententiously expressive, and the meaning may, perhaps, be conveyed 
in the following translation : — 

(It was) the king's (high) day ; — the princes polluted themselves: — 

Inflaming heat (proceeded) from wine ; — 

(Even) he (the king) drew out his hand with mockers 1 

As among the children of Judah the priest and the prophet erred through wine, 
among the children of Ephraim the king and the princes were numbered, through 
wine, among the impure and the scoffers. Some other consequences of this vinous 
indulgence are described in ver. 7, 8, 9 : — "They are all hot as an oven, and have 
devoured their judges ; all their kings are fallen : there is none among them that 
calleth unto me. Ephraim, he hath mixed himself among the people ; Ephraim is 
a cake not turned [burnt and spoilt]. Strangers have devoured his strength, and 
he knoweth it not : yea, gray hairs are here and there upon him, yet he knoweth 
not." A striking resemblance exists between this language and that used in Prov. 
xxiii. 29 — 35. 



Chapter VII. Verse 14. 

And they have not cried unto me with their heart, when they 
howled upon their beds : they assemble themselves for corn and wine, 
and they rebel against me. 



They assemble themselves for corn and wine] Hebrew, al dahgan vl 
tirosh yithgorahru, 'for corn and vine-fruit they assemble themselves.' Gesenius 
thinks that the allusion is to meetings for supplicating the idols to grant fertility to 
the soil. Lxx., epi sito kai oino katetemnonto, 'for corn and wine they have cut 
themselves' =z. e. in order to propitiate their gods. So the Arabic. V., super 
triticum ei vinum ruminabant, 'upon corn and wine they ruminate.' As God 
here adds, ' They have rebelled against Me,' this verse may throw light upon chap, 
iv. II ; for it might be- said that both corn and wine had taken away their heart, 
since in order to obtain them, the people engaged in idolatrous worship. 



Chapter IX. Verse 2. 



The floor and the winepress shall not feed them, and the new wine 
shall fail in her. 



HOSEA, XIV. 7. 223 



The Lxx. reads, 'the threshing-floor and the winepress (leenos) knew them 
not, and the wine deceived them,' — kai ho oinos epseusato autous. V., 'the 
(threshing) floor and the winepress (torcular) shall not feed them, and the wine 
shall deceive them,' — et vinum mentieiur eis. T., 'from the threshing-floor and 
the press they shall not be nourished ; the vine shall not suffice for them.' 

Winepress] Hebrew, yeqeb — the place where grapes were trodden and their 
juice collected; corresponding with got en — the place where grain was stored and 
winnowed. 

And the new wine shall fail in her] Hebrew, ve-tirosh yekakhesh bah, 
'and the vine-fruit shall fail (or decrease) in her.' Here the failure of tiros h 
represents the failure of all the fruits of the earth. Gesenius refers to this passage 
as an instance where the verb kakhash 'is used of the productions of the earth? 



Chapter IX. Verse 4. 
They shall not offer wine offerings to the Lord, neither shall they 
be pleasing unto him : their sacrifices shall be unto them as the bread 
of mourners; all that eat thereof shall be polluted: for their bread for 
their soul shall not come into the house of the Lord. 



They shall not offer wine offerings unto the Lord] Hebrew, lo 
yessekic la-Yehoveh yayin, 'they shall not pour out wine to Jehovah.' Lxx., ouk 
espeisan to Kurib oinon, 'they have not poured out wine to the Lord.' V., non 
libabant Domino vinum, 'they will not pour out wine to the Lord.' 



Chapter IX. Verse 10. 
I found Israel like grapes in the wilderness ; I saw your fathers as 
the firstripe in the fig tree at her first time ; but they went to Baal- 
peor, and separated themselves unto that shame ; and their abomina- 
tions were according as they loved. 



Like grapes] Hebrew, ka-anahvim, 'like grape-clusters.' 



Chapter X. Verse i. 
Israel is an empty vine, he bringeth forth fruit unto himself: 
according to the multitude of his fruit he hath increased the altars ; 
according to the goodness of his land they have made goodly images. 



An empty vine] Hebrew, gephen boqaq, 'a vine emptying' (itself). Lxx., 
eukleematousa, 'branching out well'; V., frondosa, 'leafy.' Henderson has 
'luxuriant.' According to the A. V., the sense would be that Israel, having, for 
his own use, emptied himself of his fruit, had left nothing for the Divine husband- 
man. He was empty, or barren, God-wards. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 7. 
They that dwell under his shadow shall return ; they shall revive 
as the corn, and grow as the vine : the scent thereof shall be as the 
wine of Lebanon. 



224 HOSE A, XIV. 7. 



And grow as the vine] Hebrew, ve-yiphrekhu kag-gahphen, * and they shall 
bud forth like the vine.' 

The scent thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon] Hebrew, 
zikro ki-yayn Levahnon, 'his memorial [remembrance] like wine of Lebanon.' 
Lxx., mneemosunon autouhos oinos Libanou to Ephraim, 'his memory (shall be) 
as wine of Libanus to Ephraim'; V., memoriale ejus sicut vinum Libani, *his 
memorial as wine of Libanus ' ; Henderson, ' Their fame shall be as the wine of 
Lebanon.' 



Comparing Cant. ii. 13 with ver. 6 of this chapter, we may infer that as the 
grapes of Lebanon emitted a pleasant odor, this scent was preserved in the wine 
made therefrom. Sir John Bowring praises, as of 'excellent quality,' a wine con- 
sumed in some of the convents of Lebanon, 'known by the name of the vino d'or 
[golden wine]. The custom of boiling wine he found to be almost universal.' The 
Rev. J. A. Wylie, in his 'Modern Judea compared with Ancient Prophecy,' states 
that "the wines of Lebanon are of three kinds — the white, the yellow, and the 
red. The white is rather bitter, the yellow and red are too sweet j but if the red 
is not boiled, it is equal almost to that of Bordeaux." 



THE 

BOOK OF THE PROPHET JOEL, 



[Joel, who wrote about 860 years before Christ, prophesied the 
invasion of the land by armies of locusts, that should lay waste 
every green thing.] 



Chapter I. Verse 5. 
Awake, ye drunkards, and weep ; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, 
because of the new wine ; for it is cut off from your mouth. 



Drunkards] Hebrew, shikorim, ' drunken ones ' = those who fill themselves ; 
perhaps with an allusion to shakar, so as to include all the tipplers of the time, — 
lovers of shakar { palm-juice, etc.) and lovers of y 'ay 'in (grape-juice). 

All ye drinkers of wine] Hebrew, kahl-shothai yayin, 'all drinkers of 
wine.' 

Because of the new wine] Hebrew, al ahsis, 'for the fresh juice,' — the 
juice as it flows from under the treader's feet. ' By ahsis t ,' says Henderson, 'is 
meant the fresh wine or juice of the grape or other fruit, which has just been 
pressed out, and is remarkable for its sweet flavor and its freedom from in- 
toxicating qualities.' The A. V., therefore, correctly renders ahsis by 'new wine,' 
and it is much to be regretted that the same rendering is given in eleven places to 
tiros A, with so different a signification. The Lxx., ekneepsate oi methuontes ex 
oinou auton, kai klausate ; threeneesate pantes oi pinontes oinon eis metheen, hoti 
exeerthee ex stomatos humon euphrosunee kai chara, ' awake [become as abstainers ; 
see Notes on Gen. ix. 24, and I Kings xxv. 37], ye drunkards, from your wine, 
and weep ; mourn ye, all ye (who are) drinking wine to drunkenness, for joy and 
gladness are removed from your mouth.' V. has ebrii — ' drunkards ' — qui bibitis 
mnum in dulcedine, ' who drink wine with sweetness ' ; the T. has al khamar 
marath, 'because of the pure wine.' 



Chapter I. Verse 7. 
He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath 
made it clean bare, and cast it away ; the branches thereof are made 
white. 



My vine] Hebrew, gaphni, 'my vine.' The clause literally stands, 'he hath 
given my vine to wasting.' 
29 



226 JOEL, I. 9 — 13. 



Chapter I. Verse 9. 
The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house 
of the Lord; the priests, the Lord's ministers, mourn. 



And the drink offering] Hebrew, vak-nesek, and the libation. 



Chapter I. Verse 10. 
The field is wasted, the land mourneth ; for the corn is wasted : the 
new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth. 



The new wine is dried up] Hebrew, hobish tirosh, ' dried up [= perished] 
(is) the vine-fruit.' Hobish is the Hiphil form of yak-bask, " to be dried up, to be 
or become dry, used of plants, trees, grass, . . . fruits, the harvest — Joel i. 10 " 
(Gesenius). Lxx. is exeranthee oinos, 'dried up (is) wine ' ; the V., less happily, 
confusum est vinum, ' confounded has been the wine ' — yahbash, ' to be dry,' being 
misread as yak-bask, 'to put to shame ' ; T., ' the vines have dried up.' 

The oil languisheth] Hebrew, umlal yitzhar, 'the orchard-fruit droops.' 
Lxx., oligdthee elaion, 'oil becomes scarce'; V., elanguit oleum, 'the oil has 
languished.' Proof so direct and decisive that tirosh and yitzhar describe two 
classes of 'fruits,' and not artificial liquid preparations, ought to satisfy even 
incredulity itself. 

Chapter I. Verse ii. 
Be ye ashamed, O ye husbandmen ; howl, O ye vinedressers, for 
the wheat and for the barley; because the harvest of the field is 
perished. 



O ye vinedressers] Hebrew, kormim, 'vineyard-men' (laborers); V., 
vintores, ' vine-dressers ' ; but Lxx. has kteemata, ' possessions ' — not the farmer or 
possessor. 

Chapter I. Verse 12. 
The vine is dried up, and the fig tree languisheth; the pomegranate 
tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, even all the trees of the 
field, are withered : because joy is withered away from the sons of 
men. 



The vine is dried up] Hebrew, hag-gephen kobiskah, 'the vine is dried up.' 
Not only the fruit borne, but the fruit-bearer, yields to the withering influence. 
Lxx., hee ampelos exeeranthee, 'the vine is dried up'; V., vinea confusa est, 'the 
vineyard has been confounded. ' 



Chapter I. Verse 13. 
Gird yourselves, and lament, ye priests : howl, ye ministers of the 
altar : come, lie all night in sackcloth, ye ministers of my God : for 
the meat offering and the drink offering is withholden from the house 
of your God. 



JOEL, III. 3. 227 



AND the drink offering] Hebrew, vah-nahseh, * and the libation. 



Chapter II. Verse 14. 
Who knoweth if he will return and repent, and leave a blessing 
behind him ; even a meat offering and a drink offering unto the Lord 
your God ? 

And a drink offering] Hebrew, vah-nesek, 'and a libation.' 



Chapter II. Verse 19. 
Yea, the Lord will answer and say unto his people, Behold, I will 
send you corn, and wine, and oil, and ye shall be satisfied therewith : 
and I will no more make you a reproach among the heathen. 



Corn, and wine, and oil] Hebrew, eth-had-dahgan, vl- hat-tiros h, vl-hay- 
yitzhar, 'the corn and the vine-fruit, and the orchard-fruit.' Lxx., siton oinon, 
elaion, V., frumentum, etvinum, et oleum, 'corn, and wine, and oil.' 



Chapter II. Verse 22. 
Be not afraid, ye beasts of the field : for the pastures of the wilder- 
ness do spring, for the tree beareth her fruit, the fig tree and the vine 
do yield their strength. 



And the vine] Hebrew, vah-gephen, 'and the vine'; Lxx., ampelos ; 
V., vinea. 

Chapter II. Verse 24. 

And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the fats shall overflow 
with wine and oil. 



Wheat] Hebrew, bar; used, perhaps, to indicate the finest quality of corn 
(dahgan). 

And the fats shall overflow with wine and oil] Hebrew, ve-hashiqu 
hayeqahvim tiros h ve-yitzhar, ' and the presses shall abound with vine-fruit and 
orchard-fruit.' Lxx., kai huperchutheesontai ai leenoi oinou kai elaiou, 'and the 
presses shall be overflowed with wine and oil ' ; V., et redundabunt torcularm 
vino et oleo, ' and the presses shall be redundant with wine and oil.' The Hebrew 
word shuq, translated 'overflow,' signifies 'to run' or 'abound'; hence, 'to 
desire eagerly.' It is here in the Hiphil conjugation; and if the figure is not too 
strong, we may consider that the prophet represents the presses as causing the tirosh 
and yitzhar to run into them, so as to fill them to the brim ; not with the expressed 
juice, but with the substances whose subsequent pressure should yield the desired 
drink. 



Chapter III. Verse 3. 

And they have cast lots for my people; and have given a boy for 
an harlot, and sold a girl for wine, that they might drink. 



228 JOEL, III. 13, 18. 



Wine, that they might drink] Hebrew, vay-yayin vay-yishtu, 'for 
wine, and they shall drink.' Lxx., anti tou oinou kai epeinon, 'for the sake of 
the wine, and have drunk'; V., pro vino ut biberent, 'for wine, that they might 
drink.' 



So insatiable is the unnatural appetite for strong drink, and so hardening is its 
effect on the moral nature, that the strongest natural instincts — love of offspring 
and love of life — yield to it like flax before the fire. 



Chapter III. Verse 13. 
Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe : come, get you down ; 
for the press is full, the fats overflow ; for their wickedness is great. 



This verse tersely describes the vintage harvest. " Put forth the knife \jnaggal 
— that which cuts], for the vintage [qahtzir — cutting = that which is cut] is ripe : 
come, descend (or tread), for the press [gath~\ is full ; the presses (hayyeqahvim) 
abound (hashiqu) ; for their wickedness is great." The prophet is here describing, 
not the result of the treading, but the preparations for it; and he invites the 
avengers (the foreign foe) to come and tread, because the wickedness (= vintage) 
of the idolatrous nations was ripe, and its fruits (the grapes collectively, tirosh) 
were brought together in a ' great ' heap, ready to be trodden (punished) by the 
instruments of the Divine justice. This text tends to illustrate the sense of the one 
other passage where (in A. V.) the presses are said to 'overflow' with tirosh, the 
real idea being, that the vintage has been so fruitful that the grapes have to be 
piled up in the presses. 



Chapter III. Verse 18. 
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop 
down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers 
of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of 
the house of the Lord, and shall water the valley of Shittim. 



The mountains shall drop down new wine] Hebrew, yitphu ha-hahrim 
ahsis, 'the mountains shall drop down fresh juice.' Lxx., apostalaxei ta oree 
glukasmon, 'the mountains shall drop sweetness '; V., stillabunt montes dulcedi- 
nem, 'the mountains shall drop sweetness ' ; T., ' pure wine.' 



As vines were often cultivated on the hill-sides, the prophet represents the fer- 
tility of the vines and the richness of their produce by a very expressive image — 
that of the hills sending forth streams of the luscious juice contained within the 
purple clusters. It is, however, a fact that, in a fertile season, the ripe luscious 
grapes burst with 'their juice,' which literally distills upon the rocks. 



THE 

BOOK OF THE PROPHET AMOS. 



[Amos prohesied about the year 790 b. c] 



Chapter II. Verse 8. 
And they lay themselves down upon clothes laid to pledge by every 
altar, and they drink the wine of the condemned in the house of their 
god. 

And they drink the wine of the condemned] Hebrew, ve-yayn anushim 
yishht, ' and the wine of the condemned ( = fined) they will drink.' The A. V. 
treats the future form of the verb as an indefinite present. Lxx., kai oinon ek 
sukophantion epeinon, ' and wine from calumniators they drank. ' [The sukophan- 
tees was at first an informer against persons who broke the Athenian law by 
exporting figs from Attica ; and then the term became applied to any informer or 
accuser; next, as these men were often perjurers, to a calumniator or false 
accuser; until it finally acquired the meaning of 'sycophant,' as with us, — one 
who, from motives of self-interest, seeks to ingratiate himself with another by any 
means, such as slandering his betters.] V., et vinum damnatorum bibebant, ' and 
the wine of the condemned they have drunk.' 



Anush signifies to 'amerce' or 'fine ' ; so that we have here the picture of men 
of violence, who, having inflicted on the weak, fines which were paid in wine or 
expended in that liquor, drank the wine in their pagan temples, — thus adding 
revelry and idolatry to injustice, if, indeed, the desire for this revelry was not the 
predisposing cause of the injustice, as it often is of robbery in our own day. 



Chapter II. Verses ii, 12. 
11 And I raised up of your sons for prophets, and of your young 
men for Nazarites. Is it not even thus, O ye children of Israel? 
saith the Lord. 12 But ye gave the Nazarites wine to drink; and 
commanded the prophets, saying, Prophesy not. 



V. 12. But ye gave the Nazarites wine to drink] Hebrew, vaitashqu eth 
han-N&zarim yayin, 'and ye gave wine to drink to the Nazarites.' Lxx., kai 
epotizete tons heegiasmenons oinon, ' and ye caused the consecrated ones to drink 
wine'; V., et propinabitis Nazareeis vinum, 'and you will present wine to the 



230 AMOS, IV. 9. 



Nazarites.' The T. of Jonathan reads, 'ye have driven the teachers into error Dy- 
vour wine.' 



It has been inferred by able expositors, from this passage, that the ' sons raised 
up for prophets ' were also the ' young men ' raised up for Nazarites, although the 
Nazarites may have included others who were not trained to the prophetical 
office ; so that the description (as given by Isaiah and Jeremiah) of intemperance 
among priests and prophets, marked the violation of special obligations to absti- 
nence, as well as a violation of general moral principle. Be this as it may, we 
learn from these verses the importance attached by God to the Nazarite class, and 
also that their pre-eminent characteristic was abstinence from wine. Jehovah claims 
to have raised up a succession of prophets and Nazarites, and the attempt to subvert 
the fidelity of the Nazarites is coupled as a sin with the impious effort to silence 
the teachers of the nation and the organs of the Almighty. That there was a 
connection between the love of drink, and the rejection of the true prophets who 
would not countenance the causes of the national declension, Micah (ii. 11) makes 
as plain as does Amos the contrary and better association, between abstinence and 
a pious fidelity to the will of God in his ' holy ones ' ; and we may be assured that 
whatever advantages sprang from this abstinence among the Jews, may be enjoyed 
in a yet higher measure in our day ; while those who pride themselves in leading 
others to abandon so safe and beneficent a rule, may take what comfort they can 
extract from the spirit of the text before us. 



Chapter IV. Verse i. 
Hear this word, ye kine of Bashan, that are in the mountain of 
Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, which say 
to their masters, Bring, and let us drink. 



Cruelty and sensuality are well matched. Inflamed passions crave for inflaming 
drink, and this again 'sets on fire the whole course of nature,' and disposes to 
deeds of violence and shame. Nor must it be forgotten that men and women 
naturally mild and kind, commit the most ferocious (otherwise unaccountable) acts 
when under the influence of alcoholic drink, which exerts all the force and tyranny 
of diabolical possession. 

Chapter IV. Verse 5. 
And offer a sacrifice of thanksgiving with leaven, and proclaim and 
publish the free offerings : for this liketh you, O ye children of Israel, 
saith the Lord God. 



With leaven] Hebrew, makhahmatz, 'with leavened matter.' The V. has 
de fermentato ; but the Lxx. reads, exo nomon, 'without law.' God reproves the 
conduct of the idolaters by ironically urging them to do that which they had already 
done, and contrary to the solemn injunctions of His law. 



Chapter IV. Verse 9. 
I have smitten you with blasting and mildew : when your gardens 
and your vineyards and your fig trees and your olive trees increased, 



AMOS, VI. 6. 231 



the palmerworm devoured them : yet have ye not returned unto me, 
saith the Lord. 



And your vineyards] Hebrew, ve-karmaikem t 'and your vineyards.' 



Chapter V. Verse ii. 



Forasmuch therefore as your treading is upon the poor, and ye take 
from him burdens of wheat : ye have built houses of hewn stone, but 
ye shall not dwell in them ; ye have planted pleasant vineyards, but 
ye shall not drink wine of them. 



Pleasant vineyards] Hebrew, karmai khemed, ' vineyards of delight ' ; 
Lxx., ampelonas epithwneethous, ' desirable vineyards ' ; V., vineas amantissimas, 
' most beloved vineyards.' 

But ye shall not drink wine of them] Hebrew, ve-lo thishtit eth- 
yaynahm, 'and ye shall not drink their wine.' So the V. The Lxx., oumee 
pieete ton oinon ex auton, ' and ye shall not drink wine from them.' The inference 
would naturally be, that the wine was really contained in the vineyards ; not needing 
the process of fermentation to produce it, but only pressure to educe it. 



Chapter V. Verse 17. 

And in all vineyards shall be wailing ; for I will pass through thee, 
saith the Lord. 



And in all vineyards] Hebrew, uv-kahl-kerahmim. So the V. ; but the 
Lxx. has 'in all ways.' 

Chapter VI. Verse 6. 

That drink wine in bowls, and anoint themselves with the chief 
ointments : but they are not grieved for the affliction of Joseph. 



That drink wine in bowls] Hebrew, hashothim be-mizreqai yayin, ' that 
drink in bowls of wine.' The mizraq properly denoted a vessel out of which 
anything was scattered or sprinkled (from zahraq, 'to scatter'), and thence was 
applied to any large cup, bowl, or goblet. The Lxx., oi peinontes ton diulismenon 
oinon, 'those who drink strained (= refined) wine.' This rendering points to 
some MS. reading oimezuqahq, 'strained' or 'refined,' instead of the reading of 
the present Hebrew text. V., bibentes vimim in phialis, 'those drinking wine in 
vials.' The T. has 'in silver vials.' The Arabic has 'clear wine,' and the Syriac, 
' clearest wine.' 



To drink large quantities of wine was customary among eminent topers. In the 
Deipnosophistcz of Athenreus various particulars are given of great drinkers. To 
swallow gallons of liquor at one sitting was a feat held in great esteem, without 
reference to the intoxicating quality of what was consumed. 



232 AMOS, IX. 13, 14. 



Chapter IX. Verse 13. 
Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall 
overtake the reaper, and the treader of grapes him that soweth seed ; 
and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt. 



And the treaders of grapes] Hebrew, ve-dorak anahvim, ' and the treader 
of grape-clusters.' So the V. ; but the Lxx. has 'and the grape shall ripen in 
the time of sowing.' 

The mountains shall drop sweet wine] The marginal reading of A. V. 
is 'new wine,' but the phrase is the same as in Joel iii. 18, ahsis, the juice of the 
newly trodden grapes. Lxx., 'the mountains shall drop sweetness ' (glukasmon); 
the V., ' the mountains shall distill sweetness ' (dulcedinem). 



The promise is one of continual fertility and abundance, one agricultural 
operation following rapidly upon another, all carried on without exhausting the 
soil, and all resulting in the enrichment of the people. Christian commentators 
give to the prophecy a spiritual application. 



Chapter IX. Verse 14. 
And I will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and 
they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them ; and they shall 
plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make 
gardens, and eat the fruit of them. 



And they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof] 
Hebrew, ve-nahtu kerahmim ve-shahthu eth-yaynahm, ' and they plant vineyards 
and drink their wine.' Lxx., oinon ; V., vinum. The threatening pronounced 
(v. 11) is to be cancelled on the repentance of the people. Compare with this 
the language of the Erythraeen Sibylline Oracle, as quoted by Lactantius, Div. 
Inst., b. vii. c. 24: — 

Kai tote dee charmeen megaleen theos andrasi dosei, 
Kai gar gee, kai dendra, kai aspeta thremmata gaiees 
Dosotisin karpon ton aleethinon anthropoisi, 
Oinou, kai melitos gieukeos, leukou te galaktas, 
Kai sitou, hoper esti brotois kalliston apanton. 

And truly then great joy shall God to men impart, 

For from earth, trees, and earth's dumb offspring — countless sight ! — 

Shall fruit, best fit for man, luxuriantly start : 

Wine, luscious honey too, and milk of purest white, 

And corn, and all that gives to mortals most delight. 

If oinos here does not directly signify vintage-fruit — fruit on the vine, — it must be 
accepted as the liquid fruit of the vine in its fresh and sweetest state. Honey has 
been happily called the 'fruit of bees.' 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET OBADIAH. 



[This prophet is supposed to have been a contemporary of Jeremiah 
and ezekiel; and to have delivered his prophesy after the de- 
STRUCTION of Jerusalem, over which the Edomites were rejoicing, 

ABOUT 580 B. C. ] 

Verses 15, 16. 
is For the day of the Lord is near upon all the heathen : as thou 
hast done, it shall be done unto thee : thy reward shall return upon 
thine own head. 16 For as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain, 
so shall all the heathen drink continually, yea, they shall drink, and 
they shall swallow down, and they shall be as though they had not 
been. 



V. 16. And they shall swallow down] Hebrew, ve-lahu, 'and they 
shall suck up.' The margin of A. V. has 'sup up.' The Hebrew term is one 
expressive of greediness. Lxx., ' all the nations (ethnee) shall drink wine (oinon).* 
So the Arabic. Here the generic term is applied to a bad wine, as the context 
makes evident. The Lxx. translators must have read khamer, 'foaming juices,' 
instead of tahmed, 'continually.' The initial and final letters of the two words 
(t, kh, and d, r), are easily mistaken by a copyist.* The word wine gives the best 
sense. It is the ' cup of astonishment ' (not of blessing) that shall be given to the 
Edomites, and they shall drink it till it destroys them from the earth. 
\ , . 

# nnand-n- 

30 



THE 



BOOK OF THE PROPHET JONAH, 



[Jonah lived about 860 b. c] 



Chapter III. Verses 6, 7. 

6 For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his 
throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sack- 
cloth, and sat in ashes. 7 And he caused it to be proclaimed and 
published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, 
saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing : let 
them not feed, nor drink water. 



The king's prohibition against the use of water by man, beast, herd, and flock, 
was, in such a climate, the strongest proof of sincere self-denial which the king 
and the nobles of Nineveh could exhibit. Is not this example a standing rebuke 
to many Christian communities, who, for the sake of a great and needed reforma- 
tion of manners, morals, and religion, cannot deny themselves the use of an arti- 
ficial, needless, and even noxious beverage ? 



THE 

BOOK OF THE PROPHET MICAH. 



[MlCAH WAS CONTEMPORARY WITH ISAIAH, ABOUT 700 B. C.] 



Chapter I. Verse 6. 

Therefore I will make Samaria as an heap of the field, and as 
plantings of a vineyard : and I will pour down the stones thereof into 
the valley, and I will discover the foundations thereof. 



As plantings of a vineyard] Hebrew, l-mattahai kahrem, ' the plantations 
of a vineyard.' 

Chapter II. Verse ii. 

If a man, walking in the spirit and falsehood, do lie, saying, I will 
prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink; he shall even be the 
prophet of this people. 



I WILL PROPHESY UNTO THEE OF WINE AND OF STRONG DRINK] Hebrew, 

atliph le-kah lay-yayin ve-lask-shakai', ' I will prophesy to thee concerning wine 
and concerning strong drink.' Lxx., ' ye have fled, no one pursuing; thy spirit 
has framed falsehood; it has dropped down (descended) on thee in regard to wine 
and strong drink (eis oinon kai methusmd) ' ; V., stillabo tibi in vinum etin ebrieta- 
tem, ' I will distil to thee as to wine and drunkenness ' = a ' lying spirit ' that 
stoops down to the calls of the sensual nature, and is accepted as true by those 
whose 'god is their belly.' 

As the Westminster divines' 'Annotations' quaintly expresses it, "They love 
and like those prophets that will speak pleasing things, and sew pillows under 
their elbows : they would be fostered and bolstered up in their sins ; else the 
prophets are no prophets for them " (1651). 



1 How strange is it that, in the face of such texts as these perpetually recurring in 
the history of the Jews, men of professed piety and of undoubted intelligence 
should labor under the extraordinary delusion that wine — and especially Eastern 
— countries, must necessarily be sober countries ! So far from this being the fact, 
this Hebrew text implies that the people were so anxious to indulge their craving 
for inebriating liquors, that any one (though destitute of the marks of a true 
Teacher) who should promise them an abundant supply, would be eagerly received 
by them as a true prophet, however false and sensuous might be his prophesy. 



236 MICAH, VI. 15. 



The same spirit is displayed in our own time, when a ready ear is turned to those 
who defend, no matter how falsely, the drinking customs of society, and eulogize 
artificial and inflaming liquors as ' the good creatures of God.' 

Let believers in the light-wine delusion read the following testimony from 
France : — " The abundance of the harvest in 1858 diminished the poverty, and by 
consequence the crimes and offences which misery inspires ; but the abundance of 
the vintage, on the contrary, multiplied blows and wounds, the quarrels of cabarets, 
the rebellions, the outrages and violences toward the police. These facts are again 
found in all analogous circumstances." — Revue cVEconomie Chretienne, Paris. 
1862, p. 1 71-2. 

Chapter IV. Verses 3, 4. 
3 And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong 
nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and 
their spears into pruning-hooks : nation shall not lift up a sword 
against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. 4 But they 
shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree ; and none 
shall, make them afraid: for the mouth of the Lord of hosts hath 
spoken it. 



V. 3. Into pruning-hooks] Hebrew, le-mazmaroth, 'into pruning-blades.' 
The reading of the A. V. text is preferable to the marginal 'scythes.' The Lxx. 
has drepana, ' sickles ' ; the V., ligones, ' curved knives.' 

V. 4. His vine] Hebrew, gaphno, 'his vine.' [See Note on I Kings iv. 25: 
Zech. iii. 10.] The T. has 'under the fruit of his vine.' 



Chapter VI. Verse 15. 
Thou shalt sow, but thou shalt not reap; thou shalt tread the 
olives, but thou shalt not anoint thee with oil; and sweet wine, but 
shalt not drink wine. 

And sweet wine, but shalt not drink wine] Hebrew, vo-tirosh ve-lo 
thishteh yayin, ' and vine-fruit, and thou shalt not drink wine. ' To realize the 
full sense we must take the whole verse: — "Thou shalt tread the olive {zaith) 
and shalt not anoint thyself with oil (shemen), and (tread) the tirosh (or vine-fruit) 
and shalt not drink the yayin (or expressed juice)." Here tirosh is as clearly 
placed in apposition to yayin as zaith (olive) to shemen (oil) ; and it is strange how 
the translators of any country could have failed to see that poetical consistency 
and common sense alike required tirosh to be taken as the solid substance whose 
pressure yielded yayin. It was to be a punishment to the nation, that though the 
zaith and tirosh had been plucked, the liquids (oil and wine) flowing from their 
pressure should either be so deficient in quantity, owing to the withered condition 
of the fruit, that there should be no sufficient supply ; or that what there was should 
be diverted to the use of the spoiler, and not be used by those who had plucked 
the fruit. 

Lxx., 'thou shalt press the olive, but shalt not anoint with oil, and wine 
(oinon), and ye shall not surely drink (any)' — kaiou mee pieete, — thus omitting one 
member of the parallelism by using oinon in the double sense of ' growing wine ' 
and '^pressed wine.' The V. has et mustum et non bibes vinum, 'and (thou 
shalt tread) must, new unfermented wine, and shalt not drink wine.' The Arabic 



MICAH, VII. I. 237 



has « must.' T., ' and thou shalt tread the grapes, whose wine thou shalt not drink.' 
Archbishop Newcome inserts words in italics, and paraphrases, ' And the grape of 
the choice wine ' ! Henderson has ' the grape of the new wine,' but has no note 
on this periphrastic rendering of tirosh, though in a note on Joel i. 5 he had con- 
fined it to juice of the grape which, 'however new, had already obtained an in- 
ebriating quality ' ! Tirosh clearly denoted a thing which bore the same relation 
to yayin, that ' olives ' did to ' oil.' The one was the fruit trodden, the other the 
liquid pressed out of it. 



Chapter VII. Verse i. 
Woe is me! for I am as when they have gathered the summer 
fruits, as the grape-gleanings of the vintage : there is no cluster to eat : 
my soul desired the first ripe fruit. 



As the grape-gleanings of the vintage] Hebrew, ke-oleloth bahtzir, 'as 
the gleanings of the cutting '= the time of cutting or vintage. 

There is no cluster to eat] Hebrew, ain eshkol le-lkol^ * no cluster (is 
there) to eat.' 



THE 

BOOK OF THE PROPHET NAHUM. 



[Nahum flourished about 714 B. c] 



Chapter I. Verse 10. 

For while they be folden together as thorns, and while they are 
drunken as drunkards, they shall be devoured as stubble fully dry. 

And while they are drunken as drunkards] Hebrew, uk-sahvahm, 
sevuim, 'and as (with) their sovh [rich wine] (they are) soaked.' The Lxx., 
gives the whole verse as follows : — ' For even to his foundation shall he be laid 
bare, and shall be devoured as twisted yew, and as stubble fully dry. ' The V. has 
sic convivium eorum pariter potantium, ' so is their feast as (that) of the topers ' ; 
the T., 'even as they have wandered by wine, so their enemies have borne them 
away and devoured them ' ; the Syriac, ' they are drunken in their own drunkenness.' 
Henderson reads, 'thoroughly soaked with their wine.' 



Chapter III. Verse ii. 
Thou also shalt be drunken : thou shalt be hid, thou also shalt seek 
strength because of the enemy. 



Thou also shalt be drunken] Gam-at tishkeri, ' also thou shalt be drunken ' 
(surcharged). Lxx., ' and thou shalt be made drunk (methustheesee) and despised.' 
V., 'and thou shalt be inebriated (inebriaberis) and shalt be despised.' Newcome 
has ' shalt become a hireling, ' altering the pointing from tishkeri to tiskeri. 



Diodorus Siculus, who describes the capture of Nineveh by Arbaces the Mede 
and Belesis the Babylonian, states that, after the besiegers had been conquered in 
the field, the Assyrians gave themselves up to feasting and drunkenness ; when the 
enemy, being informed of their condition, fell upon them, and, after a great rout, 
drove into the city those who had escaped slaughter or capture. 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET HABAKKUK. 



[Habakkuk's prophesy is referred to about 600 b. c] 



Chapter II. Verse 5. 

Yea also, because he transgresseth by wine, he is a proud man, 
neither keepeth at home, who enlargeth his desire as hell, and is as 
death, and cannot be satisfied, but gathereth unto him all nations, and 
heapeth unto him all people. 



Yea also, because he transgresseth by wine] Hebrew, ve-aph ki hay- 
yayin bogad, ' now, in truth, the wine is defrauding '= is a defrauder, a deceiver. 
The Lxx. reads, ' but the arrogant man and the scorner, the boastful man, shall 
not finish any thing'; the V., et quomodo vinum potantem decipit, 'and in like 
manner as wine deceives the drinker.' The T. has 'behold, as one wanders by 
wine.' Henderson's translation, 'moreover, wine is treacherous' — (so Benisch); — 
and in a note he remarks "that the prophet has his eye upon the intemperance 
to which the Babylonians were greatly addicted, there can be no doubt. How 
strikingly was the deceptive character of wine exemplified in the case of Belshaz- 
zar !" Newcome reads, ' moreover, as a mighty man transgresseth through wine.' 



Wine (that is, the wine that intoxicates) is here distinctly described as a secret 
spoiler = one that secretly plunders ; and this characteristic of wine is made 
the ground of a comparison between it and a ' strong man ' {geber) who is ' proud, 
and does not rest, who enlargeth his desire (or soul) as sehol (the under-world). ' 
The verdict of Solomon, latz hay -yayin, 'a mocker is the wine,' and the confirm- 
atory verdict of Habakkuk, hay-yayin bogad, 'the wine is a defrauder,' affix for 
ever upon the wine that intoxicates, a stigma which no colors of social flattery 
can conceal, and no force of sophistry expunge. 



Chapter II. Verse 15. 

Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor drink, that puttest thy 
bottle to him, and makest him drunken also, that thou mayest look on 
their nakedness ! 



240 HABAKKUK, II. 1 5. 

It is worthy of note that the 14th verse, which speaks of the millennial glory 
when the earth shall be 'full of the knowlege of the Lord,' should be followed 
by this woe, — as if indicating the love of strong liquor to be the great and primary 
obstacle to that spiritual jubilee. 

Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor drink] Hebrew, hoi mashqa 
riiahu, 'woe to him-giving-drink-to his neighbor.' 

That puttest thy bottle to him] Hebrew, mesapaakh khamathkak, 
'pouring out thy inflaming drink.' [On khamah, see Prel. Dis., and Notes upon 
Deut. xxxii. 35; Psa. lviii. 4; Isa. li. 17; Jer. xxv. 15; li. 39; Hos. vii. 5.] 
Grotius renders khamath ' hot wine ' ; Parkhurst, 'hot inflammatory liquor ' ; Arch- 
bishop Newcome, 'gall, poison.' 

And maketh him drunken also] Hebrew, ve-aph shahkar, 'and even 
making him drunk. ' It is a beginning of badness to give bad drink for sensual 
purposes — bad to give at all the brain-disturbing khamah, the emblem of God's 
anger — and the consummation of wickedness is reached when dead-drunkenness 
ensues.* The Lxx. renders the whole verse, O ho potizon ton pleesion autou, 
anatropee tholera kai methuskon, hopds epiblepee epi ta apeelaia auton, ' woe (to him) 
who gives his neighbor to drink from the turbid subversion [or, thick dregs], and 
makes him drunk, so that he may look upon their secret parts.' The Barberine codex 
has cholon sou, ' of thy fury ' ; Symmachus, ton thumon heautou, ' his own rage ' ; 
the V. , vce quipotum datamico suo mittens f el suum et inebrians et aspiciat nuditatem 
ejus, 'woe (is) to him who gives drink to his own friend, presenting his own gall, 
inebriating (him), that he may gaze upon his nakedness ' ; the Syriac, ' Woe to him 
who gives his companion to drink the dregs of fiery (wine), and inebriates him, 
that he may gaze on their nakedness.' The T. has, 'Woe to him who gives his 
companion to drink, and covers him with heat, that he may drink and be 
intoxicated and expose his shame.' Dr Henderson's version is as follows : — 

" Woe to him that giveth drink to his neighbor, I 
Pouring out thy wrath, and making him drunk ; 
In order to look upon their nakedness." 

Dr Benisch has, "Woe unto him that giveth his fellow drink, pouring forth thy 
fury to make also drunk, that thou mayest look on their nakedness." 

An able version of Habakkuk's prophesy appeared in the Christian Spectator of 
1865 (p. 94), from which we give this passage : — 

(15) " Woe to him giving his neighbor drink, 

Pouring out his poison, and even making drunk, 
In order to gaze upon his nakedness. 

(16) " Thou shalt be satiated with shame rather than glory ; 

Drink thou also, and be soon uncircumcised ; t 

There shall be passed to thee the cup of Jehovah's right hand, % 

And infamy shall be on thy glory." 

* That is an extraordinary kind of argument which infers, from the mention or prohibition of an 
extreme sin, the rightfulness of the intervening and causative steps. Here, however, all the stages 
and agencies are denounced and condemned— the poisoned potion, the giving of it, and the final 

t The Lxx., V., Syriac, and Arabic, followed by Rabbi Kimchi and others, read this clause as if 
by a slight transposition of the Hebrew,— the verb haahral, ' be thou uncircumcised,' should be 
converted into harahal, ' reel or stagger,' in keeping with the phrases employed in Isa. li. 17, and 
Zech. xii. 2. {Vide Notes.) , 

X This cup is also khamath,— though the word is not here repeated— the hay-yaym hay-khemah 
which Professor Nordheimer, in his Critical Grammar, rightly translates, ' the maddening wine.' 



HABAKKUK, III. 1 7. 241 



Chapter II. Verse 16. 



Thou art filled with shame for glory : drink thou also, and let thy 
foreskin be uncovered : the oup of the Lord's right hand shall be 
turned unto thee, and shameful spewing shall be on thy glory. 



The cup of riot shall be followed by the cup of retribution. Sensuality entails 
shame ; and those who assist in the degradation of others are adopting the most 
effectual means of their own ignominious exposure. The woe pronounced in 
ver. 15 is thought by some, not to attach to those who hold out the cup of 
inflaming drink for gain, yet not purposely to make others drunken ; but that a 
portion of their condemnation is associated with every part of the procedure, no 
intelligent Christian can doubt. It is no excuse for the fool who casts lighted brands 
about, to cry, * I am in sport ' ; and to deal out (whether by the barrel or the 
bottle) inflaming and polluting draughts, for the sake of ' filthy lucre, ' does not 
render the act innocuous, nor the agent blameless. Even when the motives are not 
mercenary, and the intentions even kind, there must be a heavy responsibility for 
the sanction given to the circulation of dangerous drinks, and the persuasions used 
in pressing their use on others. 



Chapter III. Verse 17. 
Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the 
vines ; the labor of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no 
meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no 
herd in the stalls. 



Neither shall fruit be in the vines] Hebrew, ve-ain yevul bag-gphah- 
nim, * and no produce in the vines. ' 

31 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET ZEPHANIAH. 



[The date of this prophesy is referred to 630 B.C.] 



Chapter I. Verse 12. 

And it shall come to pass at that time that I will search Jerusalem 
with candles, and punish the men that are settled on their lees : that 
say in their heart, The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil. 



Settled on their lees] Hebrew, haq-qophim al shimraihem, 'drawn up 
(coagulated) upon their lees.' Lxx., 'and I will bring judgment upon the men 
who despise their defences ' {phalagmata). Liddell and Scott give to phalagmata 
here the sense of 'commandments.' The V., et insitabo super viros defixos in 
fcecibus suis, 'and I will look down the men settled upon their own lees.' 



Chapter I. Verse 13. 

Therefore their goods shall become a booty, and their houses a 
desolation : they shall also build houses, but not inhabit them ; and 
they shall plant vineyards, but not drink the wine thereof. 



And they shall plant vineyards, but not drink the wine thereof] 
Hebrew, ve-nahtu kerakmim ve-lo yishtu eth yaynahm, ' and they have planted 
vineyards, and shall not drink their wine.' Lxx., for 'wine,' has oinon ; V., 
vinum. 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET HAGGAI. 



[This prophet prophesied in or near the year 520 B.C.] 



Chapter I. Verse 6. 



Ye have sown much, and bring in little ; ye eat, but ye have not 
enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe you, 
but there is none warm ; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to 
put it into a bag with holes. 



Ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink] Hebrew, shahthu ve-ain 
lishahkrah, * ye have drunk, but not to-be-full ' = fulness. So Henderson. The 
previous clause reads, 'ye eat, but not to-be-satisfied' {esahvah = to fulness of 
food). This comparison, and the obvious reference of the prophet to a state that 
was to be deplored, show that shahkar is here used in its primary and innocent 
sense of 'to be filled.' The same sense must, therefore, be attached to the Lxx., 
eis metheen, ' to repletion ' ; and to the V., non estis inebriati, 'ye are not filled.' 



The concluding clause, "and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it 
into a bag with holes" (or pierced), has been fitly applied in illustration of the 
folly which expends on intoxicating liquors ninety millions of pounds in the 
United Kingdom, upwards of one-third of which comes out of the pockets of 
the working classes. Wages so wasted may well be said to be put into bags with 
holes, — with the melancholy difference, that not only does the money run out, but 
miseries innumerable spring up from the misappropriation. The money loss, 
enormous as it is, is but the first loss, and the precursor of other losses — in regard 
to personal and domestic comfort, mental improvement, and religious growth, — 
that keep the nation out of its noblest rights and loftiest enjoyments, by wasting 
its splendid opportunities of progress. 



Chapter I. Verse ii. 



And I called for a drought upon the land, and upon the mountains, 
and upon the corn, and upon the new wine, and upon the oil, and 
upon that which the ground bringeth forth, and upon men, and upon 
cattle, and upon all the labor of the hands. 



244 HAGGAI, II. 12, 1 6, 1 9. 

And upon the corn, and upon the new wine, and upon the oil] Hebrew, 
ve-al had-dahgan, ve-al hat-tirosh, ve-al hay-yitzhar, ' and upon the corn, and 
upon the vine-fruit, and upon the olive-and-orchard-fruit ' ; Lxx., siton, oinon, 
elaion; V., triticum, vinum, oleum. 



The entire structure of the verse shows that the prophet has in his mind, not an 
artificial preparation, but the growing produce of the soil. 



Chapter II. Verse 12. 



If one bear holy flesh in the skirt of his garment, and with his skirt 
do touch bread, or pottage, or wine, or oil, or any meat, shall it be 
holy ? And the priests answered and said, No. 



Three out of the four articles named here — lekhem (bread), yayin (wine), and 
shemen (oil) — are preparations from the substances named in chap. i. II ; while 
' anything made ready for eating ' = any meat, answers to ' upon that which the 
ground bringeth forth,' over and above the class of productions separately named. 
The word for 'pottage,' nakzid, signifies anything boiled or cooked, probably 
including roots and herbs of any kind. Lxx., oinon; V., 



Chapter II. Verse 16. 



Since those days were, when one came to an heap of twenty 
measures, there were but ten : when one came to the pressfat for to 
draw out fifty vessels out of the press, there were but twenty. 



The pressfat] Hebrew, hay-yeqev, 'the wine-press'; Lxx., to hupoleenion, 
'the wine-vat'; V., torcular, 'press.' Henderson notes, "The word purah, 
which is used for the wine-press itself (Isa. lxiii. 3), is here employed to denote a 
liquid measure in which the wine was drawn out." But another reading is open 
to us. [See Prel. Dis. p. xxvi.] The 'heap' maybe referred to the corn, and 
the ' fifty ' to the expected clusters in the grape- vat, when there were but ' twenty ' 
in the whole building {purah, or 'fruit-house '). 



The disappointment of the proprietor is graphically depicted. Expecting to 
realize twenty measures of wheat from the threshed corn, and the yield was but 
ten ; looking for fifty measures of wine or clusters of grapes in the press, and 
twenty only could be found ! 



Chapter II. Verse 19. 

Is the seed yet in the barn ? yea, as yet the vine, and the fig tree, 
and the pomegranate, and the olive tree, hath not brought forth : from 
this day will I bless you. 



The vine] Hebrew, hag-glphln, 'the vine.' 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET ZECHARIAH. 



[Zechariah is believed to have prophesied 520 — 518 B. c] 



Chapter III. Verse 10. 



In that day, saith the Lord of hosts, shall ye call every man his 
neighbor under the vine and under the fig tree. 



The vine] Hebrew, gepken, 'a vine.' 



Chapter VIII. Verse 12. 



For the seed shall be prosperous ; the vine shall give her fruit, and 
the ground shall give her increase, and the heavens shall give their 
dew ; and I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these 
things. 



The vine shall give her fruit] Hebrew, hag-gephen titan piryah, 'the 
vine shall give her fruit.' So Lxx. and V. 



Chapter IX. Verse 15. 

The Lord of hosts shall defend them ; and they shall devour, and 
subdue with sling stones ; and they shall drink, and make a noise as 
through wine ; and they shall be filled like bowls, a?id as the corners 
of the altar. 



And they shall drink, and make a noise as through wine] Hebrew, 
ve-shahthu hahmu ke-mo yahyin, 'and they drink, (and) make-a-noise ( =rage) as 
wine (does).' Hahmah is rendered 'raging' in A. V. of Prov. xx. I, where it 
is applied to skakar, ' strong-drink.' 

And they shall be filled like bowls, and as the corners of the 
altar] Lxx., Codex B, renders, 'and they shall swallow them as wine, and 
fill the bowls as the altar ' ; but Codex A reads, ' and they shall swallow their 
blood as wine, and fill the altar as bowls.' The V., 'and drinking they shall be 
inebriated as by wine, and they shall be filled as vials and as the horns ot the 



246 ZECHARIAH, IX. 1 7. 



altar. ' The Syriac, ' and they shall drink confusion as wine, and they shall be 
fired as mixed (wine), and as the horns of the altar.' The T. of Jonathan reads, 
'and they shall be satiated by them, like those who drink wine, and their soul 
shall be filled with delicacies as a vial when it is filled with oil.' 



Chapter IX. Verse 17. 



For how great is his goodness, and how great is his beauty ! corn 
shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids. 



Corn shall make the young men cheerful, and new wine the maids] 
Hebrew, dahgan bakhurim ve-tirosh yenovav bethuloth, 'corn shall make the 
youths to grow (to thrive), and vine-fruit the maidens.' Lxx., 'for if he has 
anything good, and if he has anything fair, to the young men (is) corn, and fragrant 
wine (pinos euodiazon) to the virgins.' The V., ' for what is his goodness, and 
what is his beauty, unless the corn of the elect ones (frumenttim electoruni), and 
growing- wine (to) the virgins ? ' — vinum germinans virgines. The Syriac, ' how 
good and how useful is corn to the young men ! and wine renders the virgins 
joyful.' The Arabic, ' for if anything is from him, and if any beauty is from him, 
(appropriate) corn to the young men, and wine brings a sweet odor to the virgins.' 
The Targum spiritualizes the text. 



In referring to the nutritious qualities of corn and vine-fruit, the prophet assigns 
the ' corn ' to the youth of one sex, and the ' vine-fruit ' to the youth of the other 
sex, — not because their food was respectively confined to corn or grapes, but be- 
cause, in making a difference, the bloom and lusciousness of the vine-clusters better 
harmonized with the beauty and sweetness of the Jewish virgin than with the mas- 
culine attributes of the rougher sex. Archbishop Newcome renders, ' the harvest 
gladdeneth the young men, and the vintage the maidens ' ; but in a note he takes 
yenovav in the sense of abounding, and proposes to read, ' the corn aboundeth for 
the young men [to gather it], and the choice wine for the maidens [to prepare it].' 
Dr Henderson's note is a remarkable instance of the dangerous conclusions to 
which false premises will conduct good and learned men. It is as follows : — " The 
drinking of must by young females is peculiar to this passage ; but its being here 
expressly sanctioned by Divine authority provides an unanswerable argument 
against those who would interdict all use of the fruit of the vine. Tirosh, new 
wine or must, so called from yahrash, 'to take possession of,' because, when taken 
to excess, it gains the mastery over the person who indulges in it." But (1) " those 
who would interdict all use of the fruit of the vine " are nowhere to be found; they 
are phantoms of the imagination ; (2) the derivation of tirosh from yahrash does 
not in the least involve the idea of any intoxicating quality in tirosh [see Prel. Dis. ] ; 
(3) the good Doctor is evidently not quite at ease with the free use of an intoxicating 
drink by 'young females ' being 'expressly sanctioned by Divine authority,' since 
in all ages, and even in British society where alcoholic liquor is used, its employ- 
ment to make young females ' thrive ' would not be ventured upon. Did Dr H. 
recommend a free use of wine to his daughters or other young Christian females ? 
The apposition of ' corn ' with ' tirosh ' might have suggested to him a revision 
of his exegesis, especially when, in Micah vi. 15, he had been compelled to 
translate tirosh, not by 'new intoxicating wine,' but by 'the grape of the new wine.' 



ZECHARIAH, XIV. 10. 247 

Chapter X. Verse 7. 

And they of Ephraim shall be like a mighty man, and their heart 
shall rejoice as through wine : yea, their children shall see it, and be 
glad ; their heart shall rejoice in the Lord. 



And their heart shall rejoice as through wine] Hebrew, ve-sahmakh 
libahm ke-mo yahyin, 'and their heart shall be glad like (those who drink) wine.' 
The word * through ' is not justified by the Hebrew, kemo expressing not causation 
but comparison. The rejoicing may, of course, refer either to the gladness and 
cheerfulness arising from an abundance of innocent wine, or to the effect of the 
inebriating cup. In any case, there is no more a sanction of the agent wine, 
or the act of drinking it, than a sanction of war is involved when the Spirit of 
Truth is likened to a two-edged sword. Lxx., 'and they shall be as the warriors 
of Ephraim, and their hearts shall rejoice as with wine ' ; ' and Ephraim shall 
be as a mighty (one), and their heart shall be delighted as with wine.' 



Chapter XII. Verse 2. 

Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the 
people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah 
and against Jerusalem. 



A CUP OF trembling] Hebrew, saph rdal, ' a bowl of reeling ' = that makes 
to reel or stagger. A. V. gives in the margin, 'or, slumber, or poison.' Lxx., 
prothura saleuomena, ' trembling door-posts ' ; V., superliminare crapula, 'an 
upper lintel (of a door) of intoxication.' T., 'a bowl filled with strong drink' 
{marvai), or 'drunkenness.' 



Chapter XIV. Verse 10. 



All the land shall be turned as a plain from Geba to Rimmon south 
of Jerusalem : and it shall be lifted up, and inhabited in her place, 
from Benjamin's gate unto the place of the first gate, unto the corner 
gate, and from the tower of Hananeel unto the king's winepresses. 



Unto the king's winepresses] Hebrew, ad yiqvai ham-mlfek, « to the 
wine-presses of the king.' 



THE BOOK OF 

THE PROPHET MALACHI. 



[Malachi flourished about the year 400 B. c] 



Chapter III. Verse ii. 
And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not 
destroy the fruits of your ground: neither shall your vine cast her 
fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of hosts. 



Neither shall your vine, etc.] Hebrew, ve-lo tishakkal lahkem hag-gephen 
bas-sahdeh, 'and the vine in the field shall not be abortive ( = sterile) to you.' 
Lxx., 'and the vine which is in the field shall surely not be weakly (or sick) ' — 
ou tnee astheneesee. V., 'nor shall the vine (or vineyard = vinea) in the field be 
sterile (sterilts).' 



The gephen sahdeh, 'vine of the field,' was a species of vine suffered to run un- 
trained in the open country (see Note on 2 Kings iv. 29) ; hence the promise that 
even the wild vine should cease to be barren, and should bear fruit worthy of the 
name, was a striking assurance of the Divine blessing upon the land of Judea. 



ADDITIONAL NOTES. 



Genesis XL. Verses 9 — 13, 21. 
Philo, in his Treatise on Joseph, gives an account of the imprisonment of the 
young Hebrew and the dreams of the chief butler and baker. Of the former he 
states: — "Then first the chief- wine-pourer (archioinockoos) declares, It seemed to 
me that a great vine of three roots brought forth one very vigorous and fruitful 
stock, bearing clusters as if in the height of summer; and as the grapes had a 
high, ripe color, I gathered the clusters and gently squeezed them into the royal 
cup, and when it contained sufficient of the pure wine (akratou), I presented it to 
the king." Joseph predicts his restoration to his office at court, and adds, "In 
order to the confirmation of thy dignity, thou shalt pour out wine (oinochoeeseis), 
and present the cup to thy sovereign." 



Exodus XII. Verses 17 — 20. 
In his treatise concerning the Sacred Festivals, Philo observes that some inter- 
preters of Holy Scripture accounted for the prohibition of leaven at the passover 
from the fact that ' unfermented food is a gift of nature, while that which is fer- 
mented is a work of art ' {hoti hee azuma trophee doreema pkuseos, de zumomenon 
technees ergon) ; and, further, that as the primitive inhabitants of the world must 
have used the productions of the earth in their natural state, so it was suitable for 
the Creator to kindle afresh every year the primitive spirit by a course of plain and 
simple dietary. 



Exodus XXXII. Verse 6. 



And they rose up early on the morrow, and offered burnt offerings, 
and brought peace offerings ; and the people sat down to eat and to 
drink, and rose up to play. 



To this circumstance St Paul refers, I Cor. x. 7. Whether the words 'sat 
down to eat and to drink' imply gluttony and drunkenness cannot be absolutely 
determined. Though the people were not furnished by God with strong drink, 
occasional supplies might have been procured, with the certain effect of stimulating 
every tendency to impurity and idolatrous rites. 
32 



250 ADDITIONAL NOTES. 



Numbers XXV. Verses i, 2. 



1 And Israel abode in Shittim, and the people began to commit 
whoredom with the daughters of Moab. 2 And they called the 
people unto the sacrifices of their gods : and the people did eat, and 
bowed down to their gods. 



This shameful tergiversation is made a subject of apostolic warning, I Cor. x. 8. 
Prevented from cursing the people of Israel, Balaam basely gave such advice to 
Balak, the king of Moab, as led to the temptation before which the children of 
Israel fell. So far did the corruption extend, that the Israelites ate of the Moabitish 
sacrifices, and did reverence to the idols. As these sacrificial feasts were always 
occasions of revelry and intemperance, it may be presumed that the one described 
in the text was no exception to the rule. 



Deuteronomy XXXIII. Verse 28. 
The expression shahmahiv, 'thy heavens,' seems to indicate that the am Yaakov, 
'the eye (or fountain) of Jacob,' is nothing less than a poetical and intensive 
form of speech personifying Jehovah, who describes Himself in ver. 26 as ' the 
God of Jeshurun.' The promise that God's eye, the sign of complacency and 
blessing, should be upon the land, would exactly agree with the words of Deut. 
xi. 12, "A land which the Lord thy God careth for: the eyes of the Lord thy 
God are always upon it." In Psa. xxiv. 6 the appellative 'Jacob' is distinctly 
ascribed to Jehovah in a similar outburst of ecstatic devotion, God being identified 
with Jacob the patriarch, as the Father of the chosen race. 



Esther I. Verse 8. 
Concerning the change of manners and morals among the ancient Persians as to 
the use of strong drink, Professor Rawlinson, in his 'Ancient Monarchies,' 
vol. iv., offers the following remarks: — "In respect of eating and drinking, the 
Persians, even of the better sort, were in the earlier times noted for their temper- 
ance and sobriety. Their ordinary food was wheaten bread, barley cakes, and 
meat simply roasted or boiled, which they seasoned with salt and with bruised cress- 
seed, a substitute for mustard. The sole drink in which they indulged was water. 
Moreover, it was their habit to take one meal only each day. The poorer kind of 
people were contented with even a simpler diet, supporting themselves, to a great 
extent, on the natural products of the soil, as dates, figs, wild pears, acorns, and 
the fruit of the terebinth tree. But these abstemious habits were soon laid aside, 
and replaced by luxury and self-indulgence, when the success of their arms had 
put it in their power to have the full and free gratification of all their desires and 
propensities. Then, although the custom of having but one meal in the day was 
kept up, the character of the custom was entirely altered by beginning the meal 
early and making it last till night. Not many sorts of meat were placed on the 
board, unless the occasion was a grand one ; but course after course of the lighter 
kinds of food flowed on in an almost endless succession, intervals of some length 
being allowed between the courses to enable the guests to recover their appetites. 



ADDITIONAL NOTES. 25 I 

Instead of water, wine became the usual beverage ; each man prided himself on the 
quantity he could drink ; and the natural result followed, that most banquets ter- 
minated in general intoxication. Drunkenness even came to be a sort of institution. 
Once a year, at the feast of Mithras, the king of Persia, according to Duris, was 
bound to be drunk. A general practice arose of deliberating on all important 
affairs under the influence of wine, so that in every household, when a family crisis 
impended, intoxication was a duty." 



Proverbs XXXI. Verses 4, 5. 

Plato, in his 'Laws,' b. ii. 674, puts into the mouth of the Athenian guest 
certain concluding remarks which the others pronounce to be very good. 

" In preference (he says) to the custom of the Cretans and Lacedaemonians I 
would favor the Carthaginian law ; viz., that no one when in camp is to taste of that 
drink (wine), but is to exist upon water during all that period; and that in the 
city, neither a male nor female slave should ever taste it ; and that not magistrates 
during their year of office, nor pilots (of the State ? kuberneetas), nor judges 
engaged in business, should taste it at all; nor any one who goes to any council to 
deliberate upon any matter of moment ; neither any one in the daytime at all, unless 
on account of bodily exercise or disease {somaskias ee noson) ; nor at night, when 
either man or woman is intent upon begetting offspring. Many other cases a person 
might mention in which wine ought not to be drunk by those who possess under- 
standing and a correct rule of action (nomon orthon)." 



Canticles VIII. Verse 2. 
The Targum on this passage is periphrastic and allegorical, but contains the fol- 
lowing expressive sentence : — "We shall drink old wine {khamar attiq) which has 
been stored up in its own grapes since the commencement of the creation, and from 
pomegranates which have been made ready for the righteous in the Eden of 
delight." 



Canon of Criticism. 
" The usage of the time and place of the writer determines the meaning. If a word or phrase 
had several meanings, the context determines which it bears in ' a given ' passage. The more 
common meaning of the writer's day is to be preferred, provided it suits the passage, — not that 
more common to our day." 

Professor Murphy, D. D., Belfast, Commentary, 



CONNECTION OF THE OLD AND 

NEW TESTAMENTS. 



No thoughtful person can peruse the Sacred History (constituting the Jewish 
Bible) on which we have been commenting in relation to a great practical duty lying 
at the foundation of the spiritual life of the Individual, and of the religious progress 
of the Jewish people, without perceiving that it is a history of development. The 
simple religion of the Patriarchs prepares for the more complicated legislation 
of Moses, and for the adumbrations and symbolism of the Levitical system — 
shadowing forth the 'better things to come.' In process of ages, however, human 
corruption and tradition are seen obscuring and perverting the spirit of the whole 
dispensation, and the people are in danger of the eclipse of formalism and super- 
stition. To recall them to the true meaning of Ordinances and Sacrifices, and to 
re-infuse a spirit of reality into their life, various bold and outspoken Prophets and 
Exemplars are consecrated and sent forth : — 

" I raised up your sons for Prophets, 
And of your young men for Nazarites ; 
Is it not even thus? saith the Lord." 

While the one was commissioned to announce neglected Truth, the other 
exhibited the willinghood of a piety founded upon a regard for the Divine Will, 
evincing the superior value of the spontaneous sacrifice of our appetites upon the 
riving altar of Duty. The last of the prophets had spoken, and the roll of prophesy 
had become sealed till ' the fulness of time ' should arrive for the advent of its 
living Illustrator. Meanwhile the example of the Nazarites had called up 
imitators, and, while the class bearing that peculiar name may have diminished, the 
chief practice and principle by which they were distinguished, assumed a solidarity, 
and exerted a power, of a very remarkable kind. The association of the Jews with 
the Persian Magi, the influx of Greek philosophy along with the Grecian conquests 
— especially the semi-moral and religious philosophies of Epicurus and Pythagoras, 
— and later still, intimate relations with the Egyptian Wisdom, — all brought the 
pious and reflecting Jews into constant contact with some form of abstinence from 
intoxicating liquors — a doctrine closely interwoven with the religion and morals of 
antiquity. Such is the nature of the human mind, that many persons will readily 
embrace an opinion or a practice of foreign growth, sanctioned by strange author- 
ities or fashions, which they would persistently reject when recommended by the 
faithful servants of God and truth at home. Thus, while the Jews perversely 
'gave their Nazarites wine to drink,' subsequently the very same class of people 
might look with favor upon the abstinence which came to them from the teachers 
of India and Persia on the one hand, or from those of Egypt and Greece on the 
other. The Apocrypha and Secular History make certain the fact of the prevalence 
of such opinions and practices amongst the pre-Christian Jews, and the early Chris- 
tians — so much so, that unless we proceed to read the New Testament in the light 
of this fact, many of its allusions and even its words will fail to yield up the truth 
to us, which was patent to the minds of those to whom the original was addressed. 



254 CONNECTION OF OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS. 

Imagine, for example, that portions of our religious and temperance literature were 
to be perused by a people or a generation to whom our inner doctrine was unknown 
— how great and manifold would be the misunderstandings ! Mr. Jowett, M. A., 
the Professor of Greek at Oxford, may be cited as an impartial authority on this 
head: — "Such examples (as Daniel and Tobit) show what the Jews had learned 
to practice or admire in the centuries immediately preceding the Christian era. 
So John the Baptist 'fed on locusts and wild honey.' A later age delighted to 
attribute a similar abstinence to James, the brother of our Lord (Hegesippus apud 
Euseb. H. E. ii. 23); and to Matthew (Clemens Alexandrinus, Peed. ii. 2, p. 174); 
heretical writers added Peter to the list of these enkratites (Epiph. Her. xxx. 2 ; 
Clemens, Horn. xii. 6). The Apostolic Canons (xliii.) admit an ascetic-abstinence, 
but denounce those who abstain [like the Persian Magi and Manichees] from any 
sense of the impurity of matter. (See passages quoted in Fritshe, iii. p. 151.) 
Jewish as well as Alexandrian and Oriental influences combined to maintain the 
practice in the first centuries. Long after it had ceased to be a Jewish scruple, it 
remained as a counsel of perfection." (Epistles of St Paul, vol. ii. Lond. 1855.) 

Speaking (p. 313) of the sects prevalent in Judea just prior to the advent of the 
Redeemer, Professor Jowett observes : — " In their first commencement, the zealots 
were animated by noble thoughts. Many of these ' Galileans ' must have been 
among the first converts. Like the Essenes, they probably stood in some relation 
that we are unable to trace to the followers of John the Baptist and of Christ." 

In regard to the opinions of heretical writers of the first four or five centuries it 
must be remembered that we have often to depend on the testimonies of their 
enemies, who destroyed their books ; and it is demonstrable that, in many respects, 
they were grossly misunderstood, and therefore misrepresented. St Augustine, 
for example, charges some of the abstaining ' heretics ' with folly, because, said he, 
while they refuse wine, even at the Sacrament, they actually suck the juice of the 
grape / Augustine has a numerous posterity up to the present day, who fancy that 
there is an inconsistency here, when in fact there is merely a confusion in the minds 
of the bbjectors. The simple solution is, that ##fermented ' wine ' is as different 
from the fermented, in its nature and effects, as a good will is different from a 
vicious will, or a prudent ' wife ' from an wwprudent. The generic words are the 
same, but the concrete things extremely diverse. Still, the testimony is valuable 
as a proof of the continuity of the practice of abstinence in the Church. 

Theodoret remarks of Tatian (a. d. 172), that "he abhors the use of wine." 
Augustine reproaches " the Manichees with being so perverse that while they refuse 
wine {vinum), and call it the gall of the Prince of Darkness (fel principiis 
tenebrarum), they nevertheless eat of grapes." — De Morib. Manichceor. lib. ii. % 44. 

Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis, says of the Enkratites (or Temperates), " They 
did not use wine at all, saying, it was of the Devil ; and that drinking and using it 
was sinful." This was evidently said of intoxicating wine, not of the natural juice 
of the grape, which they are charged with inconsistently sucking. 

Photius observes of the Severians, — "They were averse to wine as the cause of 
drunkenness." 

From this doctrine, propagated to the Eremites of the desert, and the later 
monks of the Arabian border, there can be little doubt that Mohammed borrowed 
his famous dictum: — " Of the fruit of the grape ye obtain an inebriating liquor, 
and also good nourishment.'''' He issued an interdict against the one, but never 
against the other. [See note on Rev. vi. 6.] 

The hostile spirit of controversy, in the early ages, however, led to the doctrine 
being repudiated in toto by the triumphant party, and thus the association of a 



CONNECTION OF OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS. 255 

practical truth with real or supposed errors, was, for want of logical discrimination, 
the unhappy cause of great subsequent corruption of life in the Christian Church. 
The dark ages set in, followed by the skeptical, and it is only in our day that men 
are rising above the mists, and looking once more at the original and abiding facts. 

The most remarkable of all the religious communities of antiquity, were the 
Essenes and Therapeut^e, with their kindred associates. We are indebted for 
our knowledge of them to two writers — namely, Josephus, the Jewish historian, 
and Philo, another Jew, of the Alexandrian school. Their tenets and practices, in 
many curious particulars, bore so great a resemblance to those of the early Chris- 
tians, that some learned writers have contended that they were Christians, protect- 
ing themselves from persecution, and probable extinction, under the veil of a secret 
Jewish sect. The Rev. John Jones, the ingenious author of ' Ecclesiastical 
Researches ' (1812), and De Quincy, the critic and philosopher, have put forth 
elaborate essays in support of that view. This certainly would account for the 
singular fact that no special mention of the Essenes occurs in the New Testament, 
but Dean Prideaux has advanced another theory : — 

"Although our Saviour very often censured all the other sects then among the 
Jews, yet He never spake of the Essenes, neither is there any mention of them 
through the whole Scriptures of the New Testament. This proceeded, some think, 
from their retired way of living ; for, their abode being mostly in the country, they 
seldom came into cities ; nor were they in our Saviour's time ever seen at the 
temple, or in any public assembly ; and therefore, not falling in the way of our 
Saviour's observation, for this reason, say they, He took no notice of them. But 
much more likely it was, that being a very honest and sincere sort of people, with- 
out guile or hypocrisy, they gave no reason for that reproof and censure which the 
others very justly deserved." 

Josephus thus writes of them in his 'Jewish Antiquities' (book xv. c. n) — 
" These men live the same kind of life as do those whom the Greeks call Pythag- 
oreans. . . . It is but fit to set down here the reasons wherefore Herod had 
these Essenes in such honor. . . . There was one, named Manahem, who 
had this testimony, that he not only conducted his life after an excellent fashion, 
but was endued by God with the foreknowledge of future events. . . . Many 
of the Essenes have, by the excellency of their life, been deemed worthy of divine 
revelations." 

This author curiously refers to a secret, mystery, or oath which the Essenes had, 
suggesting that on this point of esoteric or inner doctrine, we must take what he 
says with caution : Jones and De Quincey believe that this was nothing but an 
Agape, or religious 'Love-feast.' 

Josephus further says ('Wars,' book ii. c. 8), — " The Essenes are Jews by nation 
and a society of men friendly to each other beyond what is to be found among any 
other people. They have an aversion to sensuous pleasure in the same manner as 
to that which is truly evil. Temperance {teen enkrateian), and the keeping their 
passions in subjection, they esteem a virtue of the first order. . . . They have 
stewards chosen for the management of their common stock, who provide for all 
according as every man hath need. They do not all live together in one city, but 
in every city many of them dwell. These give reception to all travelers of their 
sect, who eat and drink with them as freely as of their own, going in unto them, 
though they never saw them before, in the same manner as if they had been old 
acquaintances." Of their diet, regimen, and longevity, Josephus gives a most 
interesting account. In this manner, the Essenes passed the day : "They are, in 
what concerns God, remarkably religious. For before sunrise, they speak on no 



256 CONNECTION OF OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS. 

secular subject, offering up to God their prayers in ancient forms received from 
their predecessors, specially supplicating that He would make the sun of his 
blessing to rise upon them. After this, each is sent by the superior of the com- 
munity to work in the employment they are best skilled in, and having diligently 
labored till the fifth hour [that is, till eleven in the morning], they assemble again 
in one place, and each having a linen garment to put about him, they wash them- 
selves in cold ivater. After this lustration, they go into a private room, where none 
but their own order is permitted to enter. And being thus cleansed, they go into the 
refectory {or dining-room) with the same behavior as into a holy temple ; and after 
a silence, the baker lays before every man his loaf of bread, and the cook in like 
manner, serves up to each his dish, all of the same sort of food. The priest then 
says grace before meat, it not being lawful for any one to taste before the grace be 
said; and after dinner they say grace again: and thus they always begin and end 
their meal with praise and thanksgiving to God, as the giver of their food. After 
this they put off the robes, looking on them as in some sense sacred, and again 
betake themselves each to his work till evening, when returning they take their 
supper in the same manner as they had done their dinner, their guests sitting at 
meal with them, if any such happen to be in the place. No clamor or tumult is 
ever known in the houses ; for when together, they speak only each in turn. This 
silence appears to those not of their sect as a venerable and sacred custom. All 
this is the result of a constant course of sobriety in their moderating their eating and 
drinking only to the end of sufficing nature.* . . . They are long-livers, so 
that many of them arrive to the age of a hundred years ; which is to be ascribed 
to their simple and plain diet, and the temperance and good order observed in all 
things." Josephus records a fact concerning the Essenes, which is strikingly in 
harmony with Christian doctrine, as expounded by Paul (Rom. xii. i) — "Though 
they send gifts to the temple, they do not sacrifice victims, having adopted a differ- 
ent mode of purification, being themselves the victims they offer up" — a living 
sacrifice. (Antiquities, book xviii. c. i. ) Philo, in his treatise on ' the virtuous 
being also free,' refers to the Essenes in similar language. "They are above all 
men devoted to the service of God, not sacrificing living animals, but studying 
to preserve their own minds in a state of holiness and purity." 

In his ' Antiquities ' (book xviii. c. i. ), Josephus gives the following more con- 
densed description : — "The Essenes refer all things to God; they teach the immor- 
tality of the soul, and hold forth the reward of virtue to be most glorious. . . . 
They deserve to be admired beyond all other men who profess virtue, for their 
justice and equality. For in opposition to every selfish consideration, they make 
their goods common property, whence the rich has not greater command or enjoy- 
ment of his own than those who have no legal claim upon them. This practice 
has not obtained among the Greeks or barbarians for any length of time, nor in 
any individual instance, though it has been long established by the Essenes. The 
men who do these things exceed four thousand, maintaining withal neither wives, 

* This passage in the original is of great critical value, occurring as it does in a contemporary of 
the Apostles. " The reason," says Josephus, " is their constant sobriety {neepsis, ' abstinence ') and 
measuring out their food and drink simply to satisfaction." No one can doubt the meaning of the 
word neepsis here. 

In this connection, a passage from Philo may be reproduced, illustrating another form of the 
same Greek word occurring in the New Testament, both in its literal and figurative applications : — 

" As the acute Plato holds, Envy (selfish unwillingness) stands outside the Divine assembly ; 
while Wisdom, conversely, as being truly God-like, is communicative and beneficent, never shutting 
up its school, but expanding (its doors) as with open wings, allures those who are thirsting for 
refreshing words. For this, she pours out the copious (unenvying) stream of twice pure {disakraton, 
twice unmingled) instruction, and induces men to be filled with her sober wine " (methueinteen 
neephalian anapeithei metheen). 



CONNECTION OF OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS. 257 

nor keeping slaves, as thinking the latter to be contrary to justice, and the former 
to be productive of domestic broils. As they live in a distinct community, they 
supply the place of slaves by each administering to the wants of the other. They 
elect good and holy men to be stewards over their revenues, in order to provide 
corn, and a supply of such things as the ground produces. The course of life 
which they pursue is exempt from change or the caprices of fashion ; and they bear 
some resemblance to the clans or communities said to subsist among the Dacians." 
The Essenes of whom these Jewish writers speak, are said to have been four 
thousand in number, but on the perusal of the whole account, it becomes evident 
that this estimate can hardly be meant to apply beyond the locality of Jerusalem, or 
to any but the rulers of the body. Who the Therapeutse were we have no exact 
contemporary authority, though Eusebius asserts that they were Christians. But 
it is needful to remember, that when Philo begins his description of these singular 
people, he expressly says that ' some of them were called Essenes.' If this word 
meant 'holy' or 'healing,' like hosios, and a kindred Syriac term, then it might 
have been applied to a select number of persons, who were either ' saints ' or 
physicians, exclusive of a larger number of outstanding neophytes or probationers. 
Dean Prideaux, it appears to us, gives less weight to the authority of Philo than 
it deserves, and at the same time makes statements somewhat more precise than 
his author's language will warrant. He says : — " Philo, being a Jew of Alex- 
andria, knew nothing of the Essenes of Judaea but what he had by hearsay; but 
with the Essenes of Egypt he was indeed much better acquainted ; for although 
the principal seat of them was in Judaea, yet there were also of them in Egypt, 
and in all other places where the Jews were dispersed; and therefore Philo dis- 
tinguished this sect into the Essenes of Judaea and Syria, and the Essenes of 
Egypt and other parts. The first he called practical Essenes, and the others he 
calls Therapeutic, or contemplative" (vol. ii. p. 379, seq.). 

Nothing can certainly be determined as to the origin and signification of the 
name Essenes, but that of the ' Therapeutae ' (healers), explains itself. They were, 
like our Lord, and all Oriental teachers and reformers of manners, physicians both 
of the body and soul. It should be recollected that John, the Nazarite and Baptist, 
had a large number of followers, adopting something of the mode of life pursued 
by these Essenes ; and there was, probably, some connection also with the Sabuceans 
( = Baptists), identified by Epiphanius (Op. i. p. 28) with the Essenes, and whose 
posterity according to Norberg, cited by Michaelis (Introd. hi. p. 285), have sur- 
vived to our own day, claiming John for their great master. The same writer asserts 
that the Essenes were chiefly ' Samaritans.' When our Lord, in a season of per- 
secution, went into the wilderness beyond Jordan, his teaching seems to have had 
a singular identification with the doctrines of the Essenes, on the subjects of 
marriage, divorce, and humility; yet at the same time, in utter antagonism to the 
diabolical doctrine of the Samaritan Simon, who had embraced the dualistic tenet 
which represented the creation of matter as a subordinate and evil deity — "there 
is none good but one, that is, God." Philo gives the following account : — 

" Palestine and Syria are not barren of honorable and good men, for there are 
considerable numbers of such scattered about, even compared with the very popu- 
lous nation of the Jews. Among these are some whom they call Essaeans, being 
in number about four thousand men, according to my opinion ; they have their 
name by reason of their great piety, from the Greek word Stfioj, which signifies 
holy, though the derivation is not according to exact analogy. While they are 
most devoted servers and worshipers of God, they do not sacrifice unto Him any 
living creature, but rather choose to form their minds to be holy, thereby to present 
33 



'258 CONNECTION OF OLD AND NEW TESTAMENTS. 

them a fit offering unto Him. They chiefly live in country districts, avoiding 
cities by reason of the vices prevalent among citizens, being sensible that, as the 
breathing of a corrupted air engenders diseases, so the conversing with evil com- 
pany often produces an incurable contagion of the soul. Some of them labor in 
husbandry, others follow trades or manufacture, confining themselves, however, to 
the making of such things only as are utensils of peace, endeavoring thereby to 
benefit themselves and their neighbors. . . . You shall not find among their 
handicraftsmen any who ever put a hand to the making of arrows, or darts, or 
swords, or head-pieces, or corslets, or shields ; neither any armor, or engines, or 
any other instruments of war ; nay, they will not make such utensils of peace as 
are apt to be employed for mischievous purposes." 

Referring to the Therapeutse of Egypt, he states : — " Their drink is only water 
from the stream ; . . . they eat only to satisfy hunger, and drink only to quench 
thirst, avoiding fulness of stomach, as that which is hurtful both to soul and body. 
At their feasts they drink no wine, but only pure water. . . . They abstain 
from wine, as reckoning it to be a sort of poison that leads men into madness ; 
and from too plentiful fare, as that which breeds and creates inordinate and 
beastly appetites. While they thus sit at meat there is observed a most exact 
silence, none making the least noise ; and when they have done eating, one of 
them proposes a question out of Holy Writ, which another answers, imparting 
what he knows in plain words, without affectation or aiming at praise. 

"As to slaves, they have none; all are equally free, and all equally labor for 
the common good. The upholders of slavery they condemn as unjust and base 
despots, by whom are violated the sacred laws of Nature, who, like a common 
parent, has begotten all mankind without distinction, and seeks to educate them 
in the genuine bonds of fraternity, consisting not in name but in reality." 

Sodalities of this kind, teaching doctrines so just and true, and following prac- 
tices so pure and good, necessarily modified at once the language and opinions, 
the character and habits of mankind around them. They were a people who 
lived a protest against the corruptions and errors of their time, — the lineal spiritual 
descendants of the prophets, the adapted forerunners of that Gospel which, under 
the sway of reason, is subservient in still higher measure to the same great ends of 
purity and freedom, though, alas ! it has often become, in the hands of craft or 
ignorance, the instrument of quite contrary effects. Lust of power has perverted 
it into the apology for oppression, appetite into the excuse for sensuality; while 
'spiritual despotism,' instead of obeying the injunction of its Author, and holding 
it up as ' the light of the world,' has put an extinguisher upon the Word, and used 
its authority as a torch for kindling the flames of persecution, and obscuring the 
reason of men with the smoke of superstition and the fumes of fanaticism. 

Mr Conybeare, in his 'Life of St Paul,' justly observes of the Essenes, that 
* we need not doubt that they did represent religious cravings which Christianity 
satisfied.' Their spiritual aspirations and their practical lives, incorporating at 
once many of the negative and positive virtues of Christianity, indicate a vast 
improvement upon the time when kings, princes, priests, and people alike ' erred 
through strong drink, and were altogether out of the way.' John the Baptist is the 
culminating point of this influence ; — his public mission is the last event in that 
1 fitness and fulness of time ' that made Christianity possible ; and in the force and 
purity of his ministry, associated with his avowed office as the harbinger of the 
Messiah, we behold the purposes of Providence, uniting with the developments of 
history and of culture, to herald the inauguration of Christ in the Temple of 
Humanity. 



THE BOOKS 



OF THE 



NEW TESTAMENT. 



THE GOSPEL 

ACCORDING TO MATTHEW. 



Chapter IV. Verse 7. 

Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the 
Lord thy God. 

Thou shalt not tempt] All the oldest MSS. read, ouk ekpeiraseis, except 
Codex D, which has ou peiraseis. The^vS gives greater force to the verb peirao, 
which then takes the sense of ' I try out '= ' I put strongly to the proof.' Ekpeirao 
is the word selected by the Lxx. as a translation of the Hebrew thenassu (from 
nahsah, 'to tempt' or 'prove') in Deut. vi. 16, which the Saviour here partially 
cites — 'Ye shall not tempt the Lord your God,' etc. 



When we put ourselves into needless danger, with the expectation that Divine 
power will be exerted for our preservation, we are tempting God — asking Him, in 
fact, to manifest His power simply to remedy our imprudence or sanction our 
neglect. Whether the danger incurred be physical or moral makes no difference, 
except that, where moral interests are at stake, the consequences of our thus 
tempting God will be more seriously noxious ; still, it is not to be forgotten that 
the state of mind which leads us to tempt the Most High, even in regard to things 
physical, is displeasing to Him. Instead of being glorified, He is insulted by a 
presumptuous reliance upon His grace or power when His revealed will is disobeyed. 
Men often allege that "they are not afraid of using intoxicating liquors, because God 
(or 'the grace of God') will preserve them from injury." But this statement is 
devoid equally of sense and sanctity, unless it can be shown that danger is absent 
from the use of such drinks, or that the danger is incurred from necessity, or from 
some superior moral obligation. If alcoholic liquors are prejudicial to health, to 
expect that Providence will interpose to arrest their physical effects upon a believer, 
is to ' tempt God ' as truly as Satan urged Christ to tempt Him ; and if the 
intemperate appetite, with all its immoral issues, be the result of a physiological 
action of alcoholic drinks upon the nervous system, to expect its prevention or 
eradication while such liquors are consumed, merely because the consumer is pious 
or piously disposed, is a still more aggravated form of the same temptation. It is 
not enough to say that the liquor has not yet created the appetite, or that, in 
society, indulgence is the exception and not the rule. The answers to this plea are 
Several. (1) The intemperate appetite is so frightful a curse, physical, mental and 



262 MATTHEW, IV. 7. 



moral, that even the avoidance of the risk is incumbent upon all.* In epidemical 
visitations of disease the great majority escape ; but who would be justified in 
needlessly running into danger ? How much more censurable, then, is it to incur 
any risk of an evil that kills soul and body together ! (2) Were the average risk 
of becoming a drunkard much smaller than it is, no one can know beforehand that 
to himself it may not be personally great. That men are more careless of moral 
than of corporeal danger is due to their moral blindness, but cannot argue against 
the fact; and so, in respect to intemperance, those most in peril are usually the 
most self-confident. One of the worst effects of even ' moderate ' draughts of a 
narcotic is to render the drinker insensible of the danger they induce. (3) The 
intemperate appetite exists in very varying degrees, and though its most awful 
manifestations — as in dipsomania — are limited, taking all ages into account, yet its 
lesser degrees are by no means infrequent ; and the numerous cases of religious 
apostasy from this cause, prove that, to the Christian profession, the risk is neither 
nominal nor intangible. Far short of sottish intemperance, there may be, and often 
is, an appetite for strong drinks, and an indulgence in them, which sensibly impair 
spiritual perception, and dimmish spiritual feeling and power; and the extreme 
difficulty which many Christians experience in the effort to renounce them is 
practical evidence of the hold they unconsciously have of their subject. As a 
physical disease, this alcoholic craving has its lower as well as its higher types, 
and, in one form or other, it is very extensively diffused among all classes and both 
sexes. The hazard of incurring it, therefore, is not small, either absolutely or 
relatively considered; and God is not honored by the presumption which relies 
on His protection while the infecting agent is used as an article of diet or 
enjoyment. Upon every barrel and decanter of strong drink this text might be 
inscribed, to testify like a beacon-light — ' Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. ' 



* The fact of connection between use and abuse, is not only admitted by drinkers, and even by the 
champions of drink ; it is explained by philosophers and physiologists, as the following will witness : — 

" The frequent use of things which stimulate the nervous system, produces a languor when their 
effect has gone off, and a desire to repeat them.'''' — Prof. Thomas Reid, D.D., 1780. 

"Alcohol is a dangerous and tricksy spirit: it oils the hinges of the gate leading to excess." — 
G. H. Lewes, 1855. 

"Indigestion being relieved by alcoholic stimulants, lays the foundation for an ever-growing 
habit of taking them." — Prof. Laycock, M. D., 1857. 

" Nearly all those who employ them experience their exhaustive effects before they know what 
they are doing, and so are insensibly trained to crave renewed excitement." — Dr Mann, Guide 
to Life. 

" It allures men into a vicious indulgence, and then mocks their folly." — Dean Ramsay, 1859. 

" The use of Wine is quite superfluous to man. It is constantly followed by the expenditure of 
power. The drinker draws a bill on his health, which must always be renewed." — Baron Liebig, 
1850. 

''Alcohol is a disturber of the system, and cannot be regarded as a food. . . . The influence 
of wine begins in a few minutes, obtains its maximum in less than one hour, and soon after 
disappears, or manifests its secondary influence. Alcohols decrease consciousness, sensibility, and 
voluntary muscular action ; are followed by reaction and a miserable feeling. . . . The dose 
only affects the degree, not the direction of the influence. Alcohol neither warms nor sustains the 
body by the elements of which it is composed." — Dr Edward Smith, i860. 

" A moderate dose of wine would, in most cases, at once diminish the maximum weight which 
a healthy person could lift, to something below his teetotal standard. A single glass will often 
suffice to take the edge off both mind and body, and reduce their capacity." — W. Brinton, M. D., 
On Dietetics, 1861. 

" It is clear we must cease to regard Alcohol as in any sense an aliment. The primary action is 
anaesthetic. The exhilaration is nothing more than a blunting of the sensations to the half-felt 
corporeal pains and petty cares of life. The evidence shows the action of alcohol upon life to be 
consistent and uniform in all its phases, and to be always exhibited as an arrest of vitality." — 
Dr T. King Chambers, 1861. 

The want or craving of the drinker is the result of this law of lowered life and tone, which forms 
the real temptation to drink more and more. ' Use ' is the seed, and ' excess ' is the harvest to 
which it tends and grows. 



MATTHEW, V. 2g> 30. 263 

Chapter IV. Verse 23. 

And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, 
and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of 
sickness and all manner of disease among the people. 



In this proceeding we are constrained to admire the union of wisdom, benevo- 
lence, and power ; power equal to the cure of ' every sickness (pasan nosori) and 
every disease (kai pasan malakeett) ' ; benevolence that set in motion the wonder- 
working hand ; and wisdom that made the sensible and acknowledged benefit the 
introduction to spiritual influences for the removal of moral evil. To this day 
in the East, the hakim (physician) can gain access where all other persons would 
be excluded ; and hence the importance of a plan now increasingly recognized by 
missionary institutions, of uniting, whenever possible, in the same person a knowl- 
edge of at least the rudiments of medical science with the ability to preach the 
'Word of life.' The example of the Saviour is a direct sanction to the use of 
means for improving the temporal condition of men, with a view to their higher 
and spiritual good. Both from duty and policy the Christian Church should exert 
itself for the removal of whatever renders mankind miserable and degraded;* and 
where every variety of wretchedness and vice is traceable to the diffusion of one 
particular class of drinks, it seems a perfect infatuation that the Church, as a whole, 
should not only fail to protest against their diffusion, but by the customs of its 
members should extend its patronage to them, and promote their circulation. 
Surely this conduct resembles the propagation rather than the cure of sickness and 
disease among the people. With abstinence as an instrumentality, honestly and 
fearlessly applied by the entire Christian Church, wonders, little short of miraculous 
in their results, might be performed among a population such as ours, where the 
drink-engendered maladies of body and mind are literally 'legion.' 



Chapter V. Verses 29, 30. 

29 And if thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it from 
thee: for it is profitable for thee that one of thy members should 
perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into hell. 30 And 
if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it from thee : for it 
is profitable for thee that one of thy members should perish, and not 
that thy whole body should be cast into hell. 



Offend] Skandalizei is from skandalizein, 'to cause to stumble or fall.' It is 
related to skandalon, ' a crooked stick on which the bait is fastened, which the 
animal strikes against, and so springs the trap ' ; hence ' anything which one strikes 
against ' = a stumblingblock, impediment. In the N. T. the noun and verb are 
employed in a moral sense only, occasionally with the meaning of 'giving offence,' 
and ' scandalizing ' others. 

Ver. 30 is absent from Codex D. 



The principle embodied in this metaphorical instruction is too plain to be mis- 
conceived. Anything, however dear, and even of real and great value, is to be 
renounced as soon as it becomes a cause of evil, just as at sea everything is cast 



264 MATTHEW, VI. 1 3. 



overboard in order to save life ; and the expressions, ' cut it off,' ' pluck it out,' and 
'cast it from thee,' are designed to indicate both the resolution required, and the 
energy that should be exerted, in the execution of this duty. Dean Alford regards 
ver. 29 as "an admonition, arising out of the truth announced in ver. 28, to with- 
draw the first springs and occasions of evil desire, even by the sacrifice of what is 
most useful and dear to us "; and he observes " that our Lord grounds this pre- 
cept of the most rigid and decisive self-denial on considerations of the truest self- 
interest — sumpherei soi (it is profitable to thee)." — Greek Test. 5th edit. vol. i. 
p. 48. None will controvert the fact that, to the inebriate, strong drink comes 
within the prohibitive scope of this precept, and that he is called upon to dash 
away from him the liquor which has enthralled and cursed him. The difficulty of 
compliance with this rule is, however, extremely great, arising from the morbid 
condition of the drinker, till, in the case of the oinomaniac or dipsomaniac, 
voluntary compliance with the safeguard becomes impossible. Hence (1) the 
importance of abstinence from drinking customs and the use of strong drink on 
the part of the sober and virtuous, so that the victims of intemperance may escape 
external temptation to drink, and be encouraged in their abstinent practice ; and 
(2) the equal importance of abstinence to the sober, as a preventive against the 
fascinating and ruinous influences of intoxicating liquor, from which so few, com- 
paratively, are ever delivered. [See, on these two latter points, Notes on chap, 
xviii. 7 — 9; Rom. xiv. 13, etc.] 



Chapter VI. Verse 13. 

And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil: For 
thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever. Amen. 



Temptation] Peirasmon, 'a state of trial,' especially solicitation to sin. 
Evil] Touponeerou, 'that which is evil,' or 'the evil-one.' 



We are taught to pray to God not to lead us, or suffer us to be led, into such 
circumstances as will tempt and endanger our souls. It is one thing to come into 
contact with temptation (which is unavoidable), another to be led into it. Such a 
prayer as this, if put up in a sincere and enlightened spirit, will be answered by 
the protection of Providence extended to us in our daily walks, and by the diligence 
we shall evince in shunning whatever we have reason to believe is prejudicial to 
our moral and spiritual interests. To hundreds of thousands of men alcoholic 
liquor acts as a temptation to its own use in a manner the most injurious ; and in 
countless cases it acts, even when short of drunkenness, as an incentive to crime 
and vice of every description. Who can answer the question, How much strong 
drink can be taken without its becoming a temptation, or tempting to the com- 
mission of some folly or sin ? If ' wine is a mocker,' how can its use be consistent 
with the spirit of this solemn supplication ? On the spiritual affections wine may 
safely be said to dim where it does not darken ; and Chaucer has wisely warned 
us against temptation that may begrime where it does not burn.* So also as to the 
prayer, ' Deliver us from evil,' — it must, in its broadest sense, include the causes 
of social and moral evil : for to seek the exclusion of evil while patronizing its 

* " Sotheby a -whit wal although it brenne (burn) not fully by stikyng of a candel, yet is the wal 
llak (by) the leyte (light)." — Chaucer's Parson's Tale. 



MATTHEW, IX. 1 7. 265 



sources is not to pray so as to be heard ; it is to • pray amiss ' : yet what cause of 
nearly all kinds of evil is so prolific and universal among us as the use of intoxi- 
cating drink ? If the translation ' deliver us from the evil-one ' is preferred, we 
are strongly reminded of the counsel of Peter, — " Be sober," neepsate (be abstinent), 
"be vigilant; for your adversary the devil goeth about, as a roaring lion, seeking 
whom he may devour " — katapiee, 'swallow down.' [See Note on 1 Pet. v. 8.] 



Chapter IX. Verse 17. 

Neither do men put new wine into old bottles; else the bottles 
break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish; but they 
put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved. 



Neither do men put] Oude ballousin, 'nor indeed do they \_anthropoi, 'men,' 
understood] place.' 

New wine] Oinon neon, 'new wine,' wine fresh from the press. 

Into old bottles] Eis askous palaious, 'into old bags ' — bags or vessels, 
askous, generally made out of skins of goats. 

Else] Ei de meege, 'but if not indeed.' So Codices Aleph, C, and D. Codex 
B has ei de 7nee, ' but if not.' 

The bottles break] Rheegnuntai oi askoi, ' the bags burst,' = are rent. So 
Codices Aleph, B, and C. But Codex D reads, rheessei ho oinos ho neos tous askous, 
'the new wine rends the bags.' 

And the wine runneth out] Kai ho oinos ekecheitai, ' and the wine is poured 
out.' Codex D has kai ho oinos apollutai, 'and the wine is destroyed ' (or perishes). 

And the bottles perish] Kai oi askoi apolountai, 'and the bottles are 
destroyed ' (or perish). So Codex C. Codices Aleph, A, and B have apolluntai. 

But they put new wine into new bottles] Alia ballousin oinon neon 
eis askous kainous, 'but they place new wine into new bags.' Codex D reads, bal- 
lousin de. Codex Aleph has alV oinon neou eis askous kainous bleetion, ' but new 
wine into new bags is-to-be-put.' 

And both are preserved] Kai amphotera sunteerountai, ' and both are kept 
together ' = preserved. Codices Aleph, B, C, and D have amphoteroi, ' both ' 
(masculine plural), instead of amphotera (neuter plural) ; and Codex D has tee- 
rountai, 'are kept,' instead of sunteerountai, 'are kept together.' 

The Vulgate reads, Neque mittunt vinum novum in utres veteres ; alioquin 
rumpuntur utres, et vinum effunditur, et utres pereunt. Sed vinum novum in utres 
novos mittunt, et ambo conservantur: " Nor do they place new wine in old leather- 
bottles ; otherwise the bottles are burst, and the wine is spilled, and the bottles 
perish. But they place new wine in new bottles, and both are preserved." [See 
Notes on parallel passages, Mark ii. 22 ; Luke v. 37, 38.] 



1. From this verse (and the parallel passages) we learn (i) that it was not 
customary in our Lord's day to put new wine into old wine-bags, lest the bags 
should burst and the wine be lost ; and (2) that the opposite practice — that of 
putting new wine into new wine-bags — was attended with the preservation of 
both. 

2. The usual explanation of this custom — viz., that new skin-bags were used in 
order to resist the expansive force of the carbonic acid gas generated by fermenta- 

34 



266 MATTHEW, XL 1 8, 1 9. 

tion — is erroneous and insufficient ; for it cannot have been customary to put wine 
during fermentation into any kind of bottles, either new or old, since fermentation, 
when permitted, was carried on in the wine- vat (Greek, hupoleenion ; Latin, lacus); ' 
and when, from inadvertence, fermenting wine was poured into skin-bags drawn 
tight, the destruction of the bag, however new and strong, was the certain conse- 
quence. [See Note on Job xxxii. 19.] 

3. The facts stated by the Saviour are only intelligible in the light of the efforts 
used by the ancients to prevent grape-juice from fermenting, by straining the juice 
so as to free it from much of its gluten, and then bottling it with sulphur fumiga- 
tion; or by subjecting the juice to a boiling heat, which checks all incipient 
fermentation, and then inclosing it in bags or other vessels made air-tight. It is 
obvious that, to render these precautions effectual, the wine-bags themselves must 
have been free from ferment ; and there was no other way of insuring the absence 
of ferment save by using perfectly new skin-bags. If old bags were used, some of 
the decayed albuminous matter adhering to their sides must, by the action of air, 
have become changed into a leaven or ferment (Hebrew, seor) ; or, by long wear 
and heat, cracks or apertures admitting the air might exist undetected; and the 
wine, thus set a-fermenting, would in due course burst the skin, and be spilled and 
' lost ' ; but if the wine was poured into bags made of skins never before used, no 
provocative to fermentation would be present, and both the wine and the bags 
would be preserved, — the wine from fermentation, and the bags from the rupture, 
otherwise sure to result from the elastic gas generated in fermentation making a 
violent effort to find a vent. 



Chapter X. Verse 42. 

And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones a 
cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto 
you, he shall in no wise lose his reward. 



A CUP OF cold water only] Poteerion psuchrou monon, ' a cup only of cold ' 
— 'water ' being understood. In the parallel place, Mark ix. 41, the phrase is 
poteerion hudatos, 'a cup of water.' Codex Z has poteerion psuchroun, 'a cold 
cup'; Codex D, poteerion hudatos psuchrou, 'a cup of cold water.' The A. V.,- 
* a cup of cold water only,' is calculated to mislead the reader, as if the thing given 
were of small value — ' a cup of cold water only? ; but by the proper collocation, ' a 
cup only of cold water,' the true meaning is presented, — that even a small donation 
of water will not pass without the notice of Him who accepts a kindness done to 
the obscurest disciple as though done to Himself. 



Chapter XL Verses 18, 19. 

, !8 For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, He 
hath a devil. I9 The Son of man came eating and drinking, and they 
say, Behold a man gluttonous, and a winebibber, a friend of publicans 
and sinners. But wisdom is justified of her children. 



V. 18. Neither eating nor drinking] Meete esthion meete pinon, *■ neither 
eating nor drinking ' ; that is, as the generality of men did, without any peculiarity. 



MATTHEW, XL 1 8, 1 9. 267 

His meat was 'locusts and wild honey,' and his drink was restricted to the water 
of spring or stream. 

A devil] Daimonion, 'a demon,' — always in New Testament used of an 
evil spirit or fallen angel. The demons were supposed to haunt solitary places ; 
hence the taunt against John. The name diabolos, 'devil,' is never applied to any 
evil spirit except the chief of fallen angels = Satan = Beelzebub = Apollyon. 

V. 19. A MAN GLUTTONOUS, AND A WINEBIBBER] AnthrdpOS phagOS kat 

oinopotees, 'a man (who is) an eater and a wine-drinker.' Wicklif (1380) and 
Tyndale (1534) translate, ' drynker of wyne.' Beza gives hotno, edax, et vini potor, 
'a man, an eater, and a drinker of wine.' In Greek as in English, 'eater' and 
' drinker ' (phagos and potees) acquired an intensive force, and came to signify one 
addicted to a more than customary and respectable use of food and drink. The 
A. V. pretty accurately marks this sense by the renderings ' gluttonous ' and 
' winebibber ' ; but in regard to oinopotees, frequency and love of wine-drinking, not 
intoxication from wine, was the pith of the charge preferred. 

Of her children] Ton teknon autees, 'of her children.' Instead of teknon, 
Codices Aleph and B read, ton ergon autees, 'of her works.' 

The reports of St Matthew and St Luke (in the translation of the A. V. ) may 
be placed side by side. 

Matt. xi. 18, 19. Luke vii. 33 — 35. 

For John came neither eating nor For John the Baptist came neither 

drinking, and they say, He hath a eating bread nor drinking wine; and 
devil. The Son of man came eating ye say, He hath a devil. The Son of 
and drinking, and they say, Behold a man is come eating and drinking; and 
man gluttonous, and a winebibber, a ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and 
friend of publicans and sinners. But a winebibber, a friend of publicans and 
wisdom is justified of her children. sinners ! But wisdom is justified of all 

her children. 



1. The diet of John was simple and uniform — such as the wilderness spon- 
taneously provided ; his dress was rough and hairy ; his residence was away from 
the haunts of man ; and his manner was austere. The multitude was awe-struck, 
but the profanely bold said, ' He has a demon, ' an evil spirit that enables him to 
bear the privations and fatigues of his arduous life. In truth, he was a Nazarite, 
and more than a Nazarite [see Note on Luke i. 15]; — one who, in the perform- 
ance of his peculiar mission as the Awakening Prophet and Forerunner of the 
Messiah, was divinely devoted to do and be that which was best adapted for the 
success of his great work. 

2. Jesus, who would have done precisely as John did, had His office been the 
same, was anointed to another mission — that of preaching and presenting in His 
own person the gospel of the kingdom. He therefore did not hold Himself aloof 
from village, town, and city, nor adopt a singular attire, nor use the monotonous 
food of the wilderness. He came not so much to awe by His wonders as to woo 
by His gentleness. His life was eminently social ; therefore, in common parlance, 
He came 'eating and drinking,' while for both food and drink He was dependent 
upon the grateful bounty of His friends. As the austerity of John's life led his 
slanderers to charge him with being possessed by a demon, so the suavity of Jesus 
led the same vituperators to charge Him with indulgence in sensuous delights, with 
addiction to 'the pleasures of the table,' with pampering His appetite, and 
gratifying a taste for 'good living' — with being 'an eater and wine-drinker,' a 
lover of dainty food and drink ! There was no ground for this charge ; for self- 



268 MATTHEW, XII. 26. 



indulgence, especially in meats and drinks, was opposed to the whole purpose of 
His advent and redeeming work. He was the grandest example of Self-Denial 
the world ever beheld ; and whoever wishes for countenance in luxurious tastes and 
habits must go elsewhere than to Christ, 'the Man of sorrows.' The reasoning 
that "John drank no wine, while Christ did, therefore we may," overlooks or con- 
founds the most important distinctions, (i) It ignores the fact that John, as a 
Nazarite, abstained from all solid produce of the vine, and from all juice of the 
grape, and that Jesus, not being a Nazarite, was not under the same obligation, and 
did not so abstain, as we know from the account of the Last Supper; but the 
inference that therefore Jesus partook of intoxicating liquor (such as Solomon and 
Habakkuk condemned) is wholly unsupported and unjustified. The contrast was 
neither universal nor special, but general, and hence the inference is illogical. It 
is not necessary to assume that Christ drank all kinds of wine — good, bad, or 
indifferent — because John abstained from all kinds, much less that He drank only 
intoxicating wine ! No one ever thought of arguing in the same style in regard to 
the contrast concerning 'eating.' (2) The objection confounds the official life of 
John and Jesus with their personal character, and virtually assigns to John a 
superiority in self-denial to the Master. It supposes that Jesus indulged Himself 
in things which John refrained from under a more rigorous and refined "ideal of 
temperance ; whereas, as we have remarked, their difference of living was due to 
their difference of office ; and there is not a particle of evidence for the theory that 
would assign to John a mortification of fleshly desire which the Saviour did not 
practise. Men who drink strong* drink ' because they like it ' — from the animal 
excitement or ' comfort ' it occasions, — and who refuse to deny themselves its use, 
in spite of all the good they might thereby effect, cannot be permitted to shield 
themselves by their appeal to the spotless Saviour, 'who pleased not Himself,' and 
"whose meat and drink it was to do the will of His father, and to finish His 
work." The real sacrilege of such an appeal is thinly disguised beneath the veil of 
affected reverence which it puts on. Whatever food or drink the Lord may have 
partaken of was not for the purpose of gratifying any mere fleshly desire, nor is 
any one warranted in affirming that the kind of food or drink He consumed was 
calculated, like the alcoholic liquors now in use, to engender an intemperate 
appetite, and rob man of his priceless dower of reason and spiritual affection. 
John the Baptist had not a demon, and Jesus was neither an effeminate nor 
voracious consumer of food and drink. 

3. 'Wisdom is justified of her children.' She is vindicated by the works of 
goodness and utility to which she gives birth; and as John and his Lord have 
been so justified, despite the aspersions of their enemies, so every true reform, such 
as the Temperance movement, illustrates the wisdom out of which it has sprung 
by the excellence of its effects. ' By their fruits ye shall know them ' is a criterion 
as applicable to institutions as to men. 



Chapter XII. Verse 26. 
And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself; how 
shall then his kingdom stand ? 



When accused of exerting Satanic power for the expulsion of evil spirits, the 
Redeemer exposes, by this question, the absurdity of the hypothesis. The principle 
is absolute in the world of morals, — as are effects, so are their causes, and vice 
versa. If we know the nature of a cause, we may predict the nature of the effect ; 
and knowing the effect, we can pronounce as to the quality of the cause. Those 



MATTHEW, XIII. 33. 269 

who have slandered the Temperance reform as a work of the devil are confuted 
by every Temperance society and adherent. A common source of confusion and 
error lies in a want of discriminating between real and spurious effects. The faults 
of Temperance advocates and organizations (z. e. the faults of fallible men, taken as 
we find them) are charged upon the principle of abstinence, which is as unreasonable 
as it would be to charge all the sins of those who use intoxicating liquor upon the 
drink. What is plain to the candid observer is, the production of woeful evils by 
the influence of alcoholic beverages, and the cessation of these evils (except where 
they have become morbidly chronic) whenever these beverages are renounced.* 
'To call evil good, and good evil,' does not alter the constitution of things, but it 
is a serious offence against the Divine law, and will be followed by a perversion of 
the moral sense in the offender himself. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 33. 
Another parable spake he unto them j The kingdom of heaven is 
like unto leaven, which a woman took, and hid in three measures of 
meal, till the whole was leavened. 



To leaven] Zumee, 'to ferment.' Yeast is albumen in a state of decay. The 
action of leaven in dough converts the saccharine particles into alcohol and car- 
bonic acid gas, when the effort of the gas to escape (or rise by its levity), gives to 
the dough the porousness of light bread. But by pumping artificially made gas 
into the dough, as is now done under Dagleish's patent for aerated bread, the same 
effect is produced, and the waste of flour (about a twelfth part), always consequent 
upon the fermenting process, is avoided. This waste, taking into account the 
quantity of bread annually manufactured, is very great. The alcohol generated in 
common dough by fermentation is afterward expelled by the heat of baking. An 
attempt once made to collect the spirit thus evolved, entirely failed as a speculation, 
owing to the smallness of the quantity and the difficulty and expense of condens- 
ing the vapor ; otherwise the alcohol might have been economized for scientific 
purposes. 

In three measures of meal] Eis aleurou sata tria, 'in three sata of flour' 
(or meal). The word salon was the Greek form of the Hebrew seah, the third of 
an ephah, and was equal to 2^ English gallons. Aleuron (from aleo, to grind) 
denoted the meal of any sort of grain separated from the husks. 

Till the whole was leavened] Heds ou ezumothee holon, 'until the whole 
(mass) was fermented.' 



The Saviour here selects one characteristic of leaven to symbolize the penetrating 
and assimilating power of His heavenly influence. Such a simile does not modify 
the striking analogy between ferment and corruption in doctrine or life. When 
the Lord declared, ' I will come on thee as a thief,' the single point of comparison 
is never mistaken, as it often is in the text before us, where prejudice and appetite 
interpose their blinding influence. 

* The Report of the Committee on Intemperance of the English Ecclesiastical Province of Can- 
terbury (1869), shows that in 1500 districts where the traffic in drink is suppressed by local power, 
drunkenness, crime, lunacy and idiotcy are all but nil, while pauperism is at a minimum. An enter- 
prise which thus empties Satan's kingdom can hardly originate with him. 



270 MATTHEW, XV. II, l6 — 20. 

Chapter XIV. Verses 6, 7. 
6 But when Herod's birthday was kept, the daughter of Herodias 
danced before them, and pleased Herod. 7 Whereupon he promised 
with an oath to give her whatsoever she would ask. 



These texts, compared with Mark vi. 20 — 26, make it very evident that during 
the excitement of a birthday revel Herod had lost his habitual caution, and given 
a rash and wicked promise to a beautiful but profligate woman, in obedience to 
which he sacrificed the life of a great preacher of the Reformation, to whom, in 
his sober senses, he had respectfully and gladly listened. In our comments on 
various passages of the Old Testament we have already illustrated the relations 
between intemperance and the unwise and cruel acts of kings and rulers. From 
the time of Alexander to the present day history is full of terrible examples of 
the disastrous political influences of drinking, one of the latest of which has been 
seen in the British Abyssinian war (1867-8), King Theodore, from being a prudent 
and amiable ruler, having been gradually transformed, by his drinking habits, into 
a sanguinary and capricious tyrant, altogether unamenable to the power of reason. 



Chapter XV. Verses ii, 16 — 20. 
11 Not that which goeth into the mouth defileth a man ; but that 
which cometh out of the mouth, this defileth a man. ... 16 And 
Jesus said, Are ye also yet without understanding ? 17 Do not ye yet 
understand, that whatsoever entereth in at the mouth goeth into the 
belly, and is cast out into the draught ? 18 But those things which 
proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart ; and they defile 
the man. 19 For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, 
adulteries, fornication, thefts, false witness, blasphemies: 20 These 
are the things which defile a man : but to eat with unwashen hands 
defileth not a man. 



This passage (with the corresponding one, Mark vii. 15, 18 — 23) has been 
strangely cited to prove that intoxicating liquors, as physical agents, cannot defile 
a man, seeing that all evil is from within, and not from without. 

1. Those who reason after this fashion should, by virtue of the same premises, 
deny that any quantity of intoxicating liquor can defile the user ; and that since no 
moral or immoral effect is connected with it, whether the quantity consumed be 
a glass or a gallon, a beaker or a barrel, matters nothing. 

2. Were it granted that intemperance is a sin of the heart, like pride, covetous- 
ness, etc., yet the occasion of the sin being intimately connected with the use of 
strong-drink, abstinence from the drink may be highly expedient as a means of 
avoiding the sin. 

3. Could it even be proved (contrary to all evidence and experience) that as a 
mental offence (the desire to get drunk), intemperance would be as frequent as it is 
now, were all intoxicating liquors banished, — the absence of the actual and overt 
offence would exempt the world from so much suffering, civil crime, and social 
calamity, that the exclusion of the drinks would be worthy of every effort to 
secure it. 

4. The scope of the Saviour's teaching in this place is entirely distorted by the 
attempt to deduce from it the conclusion, that the use of intoxicating liquors is a 



MATTHEW, XVI. 6, II, 12. 27 1 

matter of moral indifference, and that intemperance originates in the heart. (1) 
The Lord is opposing that superstition of the Pharisees which attached a moral 
value to the ceremonial purifications and distinctions of food as clean and unclean ; 
and He asserts, in contradiction to them, that moral evil is of the heart, and cannot 
depend upon what is eaten, and how it is partaken of — though, of course, either 
might illustrate the state of the heart in relation to a Divine precept. But certainly, 
to ignore natural influences by the authority of a text which sets up real as above 
ceremonial distinctions* is a case of clear perversion. (2) The Lord's remarks had 
,no respect to the special nature and effects of intoxicants, such as the articles 
alcohol and chloroform, or the natural narcotics, opium and bhang ; and it is little 
short of impiety to adduce His words in contravention of the well-known and 
indisputable influence of such things to excite a diseased craving [see Note on chap, 
iv. 7], the indulgence of which is productive of the most criminal results, inflam- 
ing every evil predisposition, and giving rise to thoughts, passions, blasphemies, 
and vicious actions, which but for them would have had no existence. It is not 
true, as every one knows, that it makes no moral difference to the world whether 
intoxicating liquors are used or disused ; and to represent the Saviour as asserting 
what is contrary to universal knowledge is a fearful example of wresting the words 
of holiness and truth. 

5. The very opposite conclusion to the one above offered may lawfully be drawn 
from the Saviour's argument ; for if there be no virtue in mere ceremonialism, nor 
vice in the absence of it — if the state of the heart is the one matter of paramount 
importance, — how carefully ought the Christian to guard himself, as well as others, 
from all indulgence in those seductive drinks, which 'cause the heart to utter 
perverse things,' — which, unlike ordinary articles of food, act specifically upon 
the nervous system, and through it upon the whole man as a moral and spiritual 
being! Even if drink did nothing more than to lay the heart open to Satanic 
influences, how sedulously ought it to be shunned ! * 



Chapter XVI. Verses 6, 11, 12. 
6 Then Jesus said unto them, Take heed and beware of the leaven 
of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees. . . . n How is it that ye 
do not understand that I spake it not to you concerning bread, that 
ye should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees ? 
12 Then understood they how that he bade them not beware of the 
leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sad- 
ducees. 



Beware of THE leaven] Prosechete apo tees zumees, ' hold yourselves from the 
ferment.' Prosecho, 'to have (or hold) to,' is generally used in the sense of 
applying the mind to a thing ; but when, as in this case, it is followed by apo, 
' from, ' the verb expresses the concentration of the mind with a view to avoiding 
the object, and is then practically synonymous with apecho, ' to hold off from,' 'to 
abstain.' 

V. 12. But of the doctrine of the Pharisees and of the Sadducees] 
A IP apo tees didachees ton Pharisaion kai Saddoukaion, 'but from the teaching of 

♦Contrast the hardness and tenacity of many professing Christians on this subject — their 
insensibility to the circumstances of the case, and consequent duty — with the conscientious de- 
claration of a late distinguished physician, that the danger attendant upon the use of alcoholics had 
frequently prevented him from prescribing them, even as medicines. 



272 MATTHEW, XVIII. 7 — 9. 

the Pharisees and Sadducees. ' Didachee (from didasko, to teach) frequently denotes, 
as here, the thing taught =- the doctrine. 



Evil doctrine is compared by the Lord to leaven, from its tendency to corrupt the 
mind, by the false principles injected and the irreligious conduct in which it issues. 
The Pharisees made rabbinical tradition paramount to the plainest precepts and 
spirit of the Mosaic law, 'judgment, justice, and mercy' ; and the Sadducees, by 
their skepticism, struck at the root of all spiritual devotion. Such 'leaven ' could not 
be too earnestiy and completely excluded if faith and righteousness, acceptable to 
the holy God, were to nourish and abound. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 24. 

Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, 
let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. 
[See also Mark viii. 34, and Luke ix. 23.] 



Christian self-denial embraces — (1) The denial of all propensities entirely vicious. 

(2) The denial of all sensuous pleasures which needlessly expose to moral danger. 

(3) The denial of all gratifications which would disqualify for the adequate per- 
formance of all Christian duties. These acts are said to be the denial of a man's 
self, because they are the denial of those appetencies which are strongest in the 
unrenewed nature. Let it not be supposed, however, that Christian self-denial is 
self-mortification in the blind ascetic sense, or an effort at self-annihilation in 
the Buddhist sense. On the contrary, Christian self-denial tolerates an enjoyment 
of all innocent (and in the best sense natural) sources of pleasure, while it qualifies 
for a participation in the happiness of the spiritual life. It is, in short, the subjec- 
tion of the inferior nature in order that the superior nature may be more fully 
developed ; and any pain and constraint attendant at first on the practice of this 
self-denial will not only be recompensed by the joy it brings, but will in due time 
be greatly diminished by the force of habit, and by the spontaneous preference of 
things that are pure and good. The question whether self-denial should be 
practised in regard to intoxicating liquors is of vast importance. They are mostly 
used on account of the sensuous pleasure they impart — a pleasure inevitably 
associated with more or less of moral peril ; — and their promiscuous use is con- 
stantly prolific in misery and sin of every description. ' Would the Church and 
the world be better without them? would my individual state and capacity for 
usefulness be improved by abstinence ? ' — are inquiries which every professing 
follower of Christ is under obligation to put to himself; and if, having answered 
them in the affirmative, he refuses to follow up conscience by a corresponding 
conduct, he may be said, without a breach of Christian charity, to fall short so far 
of the standard presented in this passage. The Lord Jesus Christ is the perfect 
model of self-denial, for He never refused to sacrifice mere taste or liking for the 
sake of spiritual good, whether of Himself or others ; and therein ' He has left us 
an example, that we should follow His steps.' 



Chapter XVIII. Verses 7 — 9. 

7 Woe unto the world because of offences ! for it must needs be 
that offences come; but woe to that man by whom the offence 



MATTHEW, XXI. 33. 273 

cometh ! 8 Wherefore if thy hand or thy foot offend thee, cut them 
off, and cast them from thee : it is better for thee to enter into life halt 
or maimed, rather than having two hands or two feet to be cast into 
everlasting fire. 9 And if thine eye offend thee, pluck it out, and 
cast it from thee : it is better for thee to enter into life with one eye, 
rather than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire. 



V. 7. Offences] Ta skandala, 'stumbling-blocks '= causes of moral offence or 
wrong-doing. 



The two ' woes ' of verse 7 are to be distinguished. There is woe ' to the world,' 
from or by the causes of stumbling which are in it ; and there is pleen ouai, ' woe 
besides ' (= ' more woe,' or greater woe) to the man by whom stumbling comes. It 
is bad for men to stumble ; it is worse for those who cause them to do so. The 
tempter is not exonerated because the victim was able to resist, nor will he be 
acquitted by urging (if truly) that he did not tempt for temptation's sake, or out of 
pure malignity. The application of this solemn passage to the whole system of 
making, providing, and vending intoxicating liquors must be apparent on reflection. 
Who is ignorant of the dangerous nature of those drinks ? and who, if cognizant of 
their nature, cannot but know that by recommending and circulating them he may 
be at any moment setting a stumbling-block in the way of others ? The traffic in 
intoxicating liquors is specially open to condemnation, since the direct object of 
the vender is pecuniary gain ; and his observation must prove to him that their 
promiscuous sale is attended with woeful consequences to the physical, social, and 
moral welfare of society. That the State should license him to traffic in such 
liquors is itself a scandal, but the fact is not a plea which will avail him in the 
Supreme Court of Justice and Equity. 

[Verses 8 and 9 are substantially similar to Matt. v. 29, 30, on which see Notes, "j 



Chapter XXI. Verse 33. 
Hear another parable : There was a certain householder, which 
planted a vineyard, and hedged it round about, and digged a wine- 
press in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and went 
into a far country. 



Householder] Oikodespotees, 'house-ruler.' 

A vineyard] Ampelona, the accusative of ampelbn, 'a vineyard,' from ampe- 
los, ' a vine ' ; but the derivation of this last is obscure. Very doubtful is that 
which refers it to em = am, and peelos, 'clay,' also an Ionic equivalent for oinos, 
' wine ' ; so that ampelos = ' that which contains wine.' Another conjecture points 
to ampi (JEolic for amphi), 'round,' and helisso, 'to twirl,' 'to bend'; whence 
helix, 'a tendril.' This etymology of ampelos would correspond to, that of the 
Hebrew gephen, 'a twig,' applied to the vine as the principal flexile plant. 

Hedged it round about] Phragmon auto perietheeke, ' and placed round it 
an enclosure ' (fence or hedge). 

And digged a winepress in it] Kai druxen en auto leenon, ' and digged in 

it a press.' Leenos is supposed to have come from loo, 'to contain'; so that the 

lecnos (Doric, lanos) was the place which contained the grapes preparatory to 

treading. [Hence ho Leenaios, 'the Leenian,' was one of the names of Bacchus J 

35 



274 MATTHEW, XXIV. 38, 48, 49. 

Leenai = Bacchantes, female votaries of Bacchus ; the Leenaia were the feasts held 
in honor of Bacchus ; Leenaion was the name of the month when this festival 
was celebrated ; ho epi Leenaid agon was the contest at the Leensean festival in 
dramatic poetry; leenaika were things prepared for this festival, such as odes, 
etc.] 

And built a tower] Kai okodomeese purgon 'and erected a tower.' Purgos, 
'a place of defence,' is thought to be analogous to the Teutonic burg, whence our 
'burgh' and 'borough.' 

To husbandmen] Georgois, ' to workers -of- the-earth '= agriculturists, farmers. 
Gorgos — from gee, 'earth,' and ergo, 'to work' — signifies one who tills the soil. 
Agriculture was held in high esteem by the ancients, and not without reason. 
Adam was charged to dress and keep the garden of Eden ; and in all succeeding 
periods tillage has necessarily been the first and chief resource of mankind for 
sustenance. 



It has been observed that the introduction to this parable more closely resembles 
a passage in the Old Testament than any other of the Saviour's addresses. [See 
Notes on Isa. v. I, 2; and Mark. xii. 1.] 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 38. 

For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and 
drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe 
entered into the ark. 



Eating and drinking] Trogontes kai pinontes, 'eating and drinking.' Trogo, 
' to grind with the teeth, ' indicates primarily the act of eating food requiring to be 
ground or cracked ; but in the New Testament usage it bears the general sense of 
estkio = 'to eat.' 



' Eating and drinking ' is here used in the emphatic sense of eating and drinking 
profusely and luxuriously ; but the terms are too indefinite to warrant the conclu- 
sion that the antediluvians hardened themselves in sin by the copious use of 
intoxicating liquors, though the probability, taking all things into account, inclines 
to that hypothesis. [See Notes on Gen. vi. 5 ; and Luke xvii. 26—28.] 



Chapter XXIV. Verses 48, 49. 

48 But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord 
delayeth his coming ; 49 And shall begin to smite Ms fellow-servants, 
and to eat and drink with the drunken. 



V. 49. And to eat and drink with the drunken] Esthiein de kai pinein 
meta ton methuonton, ' also to eat and to drink with those-who-are-gorging.' The 
structure of this clause shows that the reference is not to intoxication, but to 
sensual indulgence, — the wicked servant being supposed to eat and to drink in the 
company of those who are filling themselves to satiety with both food and drink. 
Codices Aleph, B, C, and D read, esthiee de kai pinee, ' and should eat and drink ' ; 
the V., manducet autem et bibat cum ebriosis, 'but shall eat and drink with 



MATTHEW, XXVI. 1 7, 26 — 29. 275 

drunkards.' Beza has quinetiam edere et bibere cum ebriis, 'even to eat and to 
drink with those who are drunk.' In Latin, the ebrius, 'man drunk,' differs from 
the ebriosus, 'drunkard' = 'man accustomed to get drunk.' Augustine applies 
this distinction in extenuation of Noah's single and undesigned act of inebriation. 
[See Note on Luke xii. 45.] 



Chapter XXV. Verse 35. 

For I was an hungered, and ye gave me meat : I was thirsty, and ye 
gave me drink : I was a stranger, and ye took me in. 



Thirsty, and ye gave me drink] Edipseesa, kai epotisate me, ' I thirsted, 
and ye gave-drink-to me.' 



The kindness shown to Christ's poor is kindness shown to Him, and the best 
kindness is to give in all cases that which is most suitable to relieve the real wants 
of the suffering. Benevolence, even Christian benevolence, often fails of its 
object — nay, sometimes defeats itself — by being divorced from sound judgment. 
In ordinary life how common it is to see intoxicating, thirst-creating drinks given 
for the removal of thirst ! When alcoholic liquors assuage the sensation of thirst, 
they do so by narcoticizing the nerves of feeling, and only partially answer the end 
indicated by thirst, by virtue of the water they contain. They universally, by their 
action on the blood, increase thirst to the extent of their alcoholic potency, even 
where they do not occasion that diseased state of the nervous system known as 
dipsomania, or 'thirst-frenzy,' which is fed by every new supply of the fiery fuel. 



Chapter XXVI. Verse 17. 

Now the first day of the feast of unleavened bread the disciples 
came to Jesus, saying unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare for 
thee to eat the passover ? 

NOW THE FIRST DAY OF THE FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD] Tee de prdtee 

ton aziimon, 'now on the first (day) of the unfermented things.' Tyndale's and 
Cranmer's versions read, 'swete breed.' 



Chapter XXVI. Verses 26 — 29. 

26 And as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed it, and 
brake it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, Take, eat ; this is my 
body. 27 And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave it to them, 
saying, Drink ye all of it ; 28 For this is my blood of the new testa- 
ment, which is shed for many for the remission of sins. 29 But I say 
unto you, I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine, until 
that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom. 



V. 27. The cup] To poterion, 'the drinking- vessel,' 'the cup.' Poteerion 
(also poteen) — signifying a vessel, cup, or goblet to drink from — is related to 



276 MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 

and potees, ' drink ' ; potos, ' a draught ' ; potizo, ' to give to drink,' — all derived from 
pino, 'to drink.' Codices Aleph, B, and Z have poteerion, 'a cup,' instead of ho 
poteerion, 'the cup.' 

And gave thanks'] Kai eucharisteesas, 'and giving thanks.' The name of 
'eucharist' applied to the Lord's Supper as the ordinance of special thanksgiving, 
is of great antiquity. Justin Martyr, having said that thanks were given for the 
bread and wine-and-water, adds, "And this very provision is called by us Thanks- 
giving {kai hee trophee autee kaleitai par 3 hee heemon Eucharistia)." 

Drink ye all of it] Piete ex autou pantes, ' drink ye of it— all (ye).' Codex 
D is without pantes, 'all.' 

V. 28. For this is my blood of the new testament] Codices Aleph 
and B omit kainees, 'new.' 

V. 29. I WILL NOT DRINK HENCEFORTH OF THIS FRUIT OF THE VINE] Ou 

mee pio ap^ arti ek toutou tou genneematos tees ampelou, ' I will not drink from hence 
out of this, the offspring of the vine.' Genneema is 'that which is born ' or 'pro- 
duced,' from gennao, ' to beget.' Codices Aleph, A, B, C, and D, all read genee- 
matos (with one ri). 

Until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's 
KINGDOM] Heds tees heemeras ekeinees, hotan auto find meth? humon kainon en tee 
basileia tou patros mou, ' until that day when I will drink it with you new in the 
kingdom of my Father.' Papias, who lived just at the close of the apostolic age, 
and wrote an 'Exposition of the Oracles of the Lord,' gives a legendary account 
of a prophecy ascribed to the Saviour, and contained in these words, — " The days 
shall come in which vines shall grow, each bearing ten thousand shoots, and on 
each shoot ten thousand branches, and on each branch ten thousand twigs, and on 
each twig ten thousand clusters, and on each cluster ten thousand grapes, and each 
grape when pressed shall yield five-and-twenty measures of wine (oinos). And when 
any of the saints shall have taken hold of one of these clusters, another shall cry, 
'I am a better cluster, take me, bless the Lord through me.' " The passage is 
interesting in a critical sense, as showing that the juice as expressed from the grape 
was called ' wine ' ; otherwise the legend must be classed with similar hyperbolisms 
preserved in the Talmud and later Targums. It has been supposed, with some 
probability, that the legend got into circulation as a paraphrase of this 29th verse, 
and that Papias was induced to record and accept it because it harmonized with his 
view of a material and millennial reign of Christ upon the earth after the general 
resurrection. 



' The cup ' is used by figure or ellipsis for that which it contained ; and if we inquire, 
What did the cup contain ? the answer given must be that of the Lord himself, — 
' the fruit (or produce) of the vine ' in a liquid state. The further question, Was 
this juice of the grape fermented? is one which has excited considerable discussion, 
and is of deep interest in connection with the Temperance reform. The earliest 
Temperance bonds of union consisted of pledges of abstinence from intoxicating 
liquors, 'except as a medicine or in a religious ordinance'; the object being to 
avoid the difficulty that might have arisen had absence from the Lord's Supper, or 
the rejection of the cup, been required as a condition of Temperance membership. 
As the Temperance movement also was a practical one, aiming to remove the evils 
consequent on the use of intoxicating liquors for diet or mere gratification, it was 
felt that, were they for a time confined strictly to medicinal or sacramental purposes, 
that practical purpose would not be seriously impaired. But its opponents would 
not permit this neutrality to exist ; they taunted its friends with inconsistency in 



MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 277 

using, as the symbol of redemption, that liquor which they condemned unsparingly 
elsewhere; and such taunts, combined with the scruples of abstainers and the 
attraction of the subject itself, led to a more careful and exact inquiry into the 
nature of this Eucharistal emblem. 

I. Those who hold that the 'cup' contained fermented grape-juice allege — 
I. That the phrase ' fruit of the vine ' was a periphrastic expression for oinos (wine), 
and that oinos always designated the fermented juice of the grape. 2. That at the 
time of the passover, grapes out of which the juice could have been expressed for 
drinking were not to be procured. 3. That the prediction of the Saviour that He 
would no more drink of the fruit of the vine till He drank of it new in the heavenly 
kingdom, implies that He had then partaken of the old wine, commonly used and 
preferred (Luke v. 39). 4. That it is evident, from the Mishna and the writings 
of the rabbins, that grape-juice which could intoxicate was used at the passover. 
5. That the practice of the modern Jews supports the inference that the wine was 
intoxicating. 6. That the ancient custom of mingling water with the sacramental 
wine favors the same conclusion. 7. That the practice of using unfermented 
grape-juice at the Lord's Supper has been treated as an innovation, and has 
received ecclesiastical condemnation; as, for example, by the Third Council of 
Braga, which condemned as heretics "those who used no other wine but what 
they pressed out of the clusters of the grapes, which were then presented at the 
Lord's table." — (Bingham's 'Church Antiquities.') 8. That the practice of all the 
Christian churhes of the East and West, save that of the Abyssinian branch, is 
opposed to the use of unfermented wine. This is specially urged by Dr Tattam, 
late Archdeacon of Bedford, and is repeated in two or three Biblical Cyclopaedias 
of recent date. 

To these arguments it may be answered, each in order : — I. That the avoidance 
of the term ' wine ' by the Saviour, and by the apostle Paul in his extended 
reference to the Lord's Supper (1 Cor. xi), is, at least, remarkable, and cannot fail 
to suggest to the devout reader the wish of Jesus that the analogy between Himself 
and the vine, on which He discoursed at this solemn period (John xv. ), should be 
impressed upon His followers. It is the true 'living vine,' and the fresh unde- 
composed fruit of it, that are naturally prominent. It rather follows (1) that Jesus 
did not choose a periphrastic and figurative expression to convey the idea of wine, 
which the word oinos would have conveyed directly and without circumlocution. 
But (2) it does not follow, even if ' fruit of the vine ' was used as equivalent to oinos 
(wine), that the wine must have been fermented. Oinos, like the Hebrew yayin, 
was a generic name for the expressed juice of the grape in every state, and was 
certainly applied to the juice within the grape, if not to the grape itself. The Lxx., 
whose translation of the Old Testament was used by the Saviour, gives it as the equi- 
valent of yayin and tirosh in passages where the idea of fermentation is necessarily 
excluded. (See Notes on Judg. ix. 13 ; Jer. xl. 10, 11 ; and Appendix A. ) Recipes 
for preparing various kinds of wines without fermentation have been preserved by 
writers of antiquity ; and the common practice of boiling their wines, and also of 
largely diluting them, showed that the action of fermentation (in producing an 
intoxicating liquor) was not regarded by the ancients as essential to the existence 
of oinos. It is, therefore, a false assumption that oinos always denoted fermented 
grape-juice, or that fermented oinos always continued inebriating; and in no case 
could the inference be sustained, that by ' offspring of the vine ' the Lord intended 
to use an expression synonymous with oinos as a fermented and intoxicating drink. 

2. The Jewish passover, it is true, was six months after the vintage; but in 
grape-growing countries nothing is easier than to preserve an abundant supply of 



278 MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 

grapes from one vintage to another. Mr E. C. Delavan, of America, was intro- 
duced, when in Italy, to one of the largest wine manufacturers, who, he says, 
" informed me that he had then in his lofts, for the use of his table until the next 
vintage, a quantity of grapes sufficient to make one hundred gallons of wine ; that 
grapes could always be had, at any time of the year, to make any desirable quantity ; 
and that there was nothing in the way of obtaining the fruit of the vine free from 
fermentation, in wine countries, at any period. A large basket of grapes was sent 
to my lodgings, which were as delicious, and looked as fresh, as if recently taken 
from the vines, though they had been picked for months." The merchant was 
Signor Peppini, of Florence. Niebuhr, in his 'Travels through Arabia,' mentions 
(Heron's translation, vol. i. p. 406) that ' the Arabs preserve grapes by hanging them 
up in their cellars and eating them almost through the whole year. ' Swinburne, 
in his 'Travels,' p. 167, says of the Spaniards, 'They have the secret of preserving 
grapes, sound and juicy, from one season to another.' Josephus, in his 'Wars of 
the Jews ' (b. vii. c. 8, s. 4), states, in reference to the fortress of Massada, " There 
was also wine and oil in abundance, with all kinds of pulse and dates, heaped up 
together. These fruits, all fresh and full ripe, were in no way inferior to such 
fruits newly laid in, though they had been there little short of 100 years when the 
place was taken by the Romans." The objection is, therefore, nugatory, because 
an abundance of freshly kept grapes could have been procured, and their juice 
expressed, at this last supper of the Lord. But even had this been impossible, 
raisin wine, prepared as hereafter described, might at any time have been obtained, 
such as is now frequently used by Jewish families in the celebration of the 
passover. 

3. It is not probable that the Saviour would associate the words, ' This is the 
testament in My blood,' with the use of old wine as the representative of His blood 
about to be shed. The inference that new wine was not used because of His declara- 
tion that He would no more drink of the fruit of the vine until He drank it new 
with His disciples in the heavenly kingdom, is only valid on the supposition 
that He was alluding to different kinds of material wine ; but no such supposition 
can be entertained for a moment.* The Redeemer did not imply, ' This is old vine- 
fruit, and I will take no more vine-fruit till I take it new in My Father's kingdom ' ; 
but having reference to the symbolic nature of the feast, He is to be understood as 
affirming, that though He was then instituting a new dispensation, and probably 
with new wine, this economy would, in process of time, yield to another, which 
should be emphatically ' new,' when the fruit of the vine (that is to say, its spiritual 
joy) should, in its transcendent purity and sweetness, taste 'new' even to those 
who had partaken of the fruit of the New Testament dispensation. Bengel, and 
a train of expositors, take kainon, 'new,' in the sense of 'exceeding all pre- 
vious experience.' And after all, were we to admit a contrast between a present 
and literal 'old wine,' and figurative and future 'new wine,' evidence would still 
be required that a fermented old wine was used on this occasion. Unfermented 
wines were made and preserved for long periods, and some of the old wines were 
elaborately treated in order to free them from any intoxicating power. t 

4. The ' Mishna,' or ' Misna,' is the text of the Talmud. It signifies ' repetition,' 
being a collection of traditional Jewish expositions and customs, reduced into order 

* Were it so, however, the argument would still be the same. For the wine that is alone best when 
new is the unfermented, made from fresh grapes, as contrasted with old grapes. 

t " Wines are rendered old and deprived of all their force by filtering." — Pliny. 

"Wine is rendered old, or feeble in strength, when it is frequently filtered. The strength being 
thus excluded, the wine neither inflames the brain nor infests the mind and passions, and is much 
more pleasant to drink." — Plutarch. 



MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 279 

by Rabbi Yehuda (Judah), surnamed Hakkadosh, 'the holy,' toward the close of 
the second century of the Christian era. The 'Gemaras,' or commentaries on the 
Mishna, are two — that of Jerusalem, variously ascribed to the third and fifth 
centuries, and that of Babylon, compiled in the sixth century. The Babylon 
Talmud is in most esteem. The Talmud was copiously annotated by Maimonides 
and Bartenora, celebrated rabbins of the Middle Ages ; and it is from their notes, 
and not from the text of the Mishna, that references to the intoxicating nature of 
the passover wine have been extracted. These references will be afterward - 
examined. According to the Mishna, search for ferment was made by lamplight 
on the night of the fourteenth day of the month Nisan, this search extending to 
the cellars ; and among the prohibited drinks are named the cutakh of Babylon, 
the sheker of the Medes, and the khametz of Idumea — all of them either fermented 
liquors made from grain or fruit, or liquors so liable to ferment that they were 
prudently excluded. The poorest Jew is said to be careful to drink four cups of 
wine during the feast, and permission is given to drink more wine between the first 
and third cups, but not between the third and fourth cups. A warming-pot, or 
kettle, is mentioned as being present on the passover board, probably to dilute the 
wine when too thick or sweet for use as prepared. 

5. The practice of the modern Jews is far from being consentaneous in favor of 
fermented wine ; and those who use it are careful to put away the branded wines 
of commerce, which are the kind most commonly used in the Christian celebration 
of the Eucharist. See page 282. 

6. The practice of mingling wine with water, both at the passover and Lord's 
Supper, is undoubtedly very ancient. But the wide-spread custom of boiling wines 
till the juice was reduced to a syrup or jelly, made the addition of water in large 
quantities necessary, not to weaken the alcoholic strength, but to render them fit 
for drinking at all.* In regard to those which were fermented, and retained the alco- 
hol, the percentage of spirit was not greater than from 6 to 15 ; and when this liquor 
was diluted with water in the proportion of three to one of bulk, the beverage 
could not be compared with the ' fortified ' wines now in use. Rabbi Yehuda is 
expressly said, in the Mishna, to have approved of boiled wine, the use of which 
at the passover would necessitate the liberal application of water, t The antiquity 
of wine-and-water in the Christian eucharist is high. Cyprian pleads for it as an 
apostolic tradition, and mystical reasons very attractive to the Fathers were alleged 
in its behalf. As the evangelists, however, say nothing about water, all positive 
assertion on the point must be forborne. If the traditions of the Mishna reflected 
the general practice of the Jews at the passover, and z/ that practice was adopted 
by our Lord — then, for some reason unknown, water was mingled with the fruit of 
the vine at the last supper. What the fact really was must always remain doubt- 
ful to us ; but whatever it might be, it would altogether fail to support the conjec- 
ture that the wine was fermented and intoxicating. v 

7. The extract from Bingham as to the decree of the local council of Braga 
proves the existence of a difference in the Western celebration of the sacrament ; 



* " Rendered thick by the continued action of heat and smoke from the fumarium or drying- 
kUn, over which they were kept for years ; sometimes even boiled down to a concrete mass ; and 
often inspissated with foreign matter ; they were, in many cases, reduced to a state of syrup or 
extract, and so thoroughly seasoned with harsh aromatic bitterness, or even less estimable flavors, 
that it was perhaps scarcely possible to drink them without dilution." — Quarterly Review, vol. 
xxxii. p. 232. 

t Vide the original, cited in ' Works of Dr Lees,' ii. p. 169, from the Mishna, Tr. Terumoth, xi. 
Bartenora adds, in a Latin note, ' Because people drink less of boiled wine,' which is certainly 
true, since boiling grape-juice makes it more saccharine and satisfying. 



280 MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 2Q. 

and no one acquainted with the ignorance of most of the Fathers of the Western 
church on many questions of Oriental philology and usage, would appeal to their 
opinions, or to the decisions of councils under their influence, for testimony as to 
Jewish manners and customs centuries before their time. But the objection may 
be more directly met. Bingham, in his 'Antiquities of the Christian Church' 
(book xv. chap. 2, sect. 7), discusses the practices of some ancient heretics who 
used only water in the Lord's Supper, and also the custom, widely adopted, of 
mixing the wine -with water. He then continues, "And the third council of Braga 
[in Portugal] relates Cyprian's words, correcting several other abuses that were 
crept into the administration of the sacrament; as of some who offered milk 
instead of wine ; and others who only dipped the bread into the wine, and so 
denied the people their complement of the sacrament ; and others who used no 
other wine but what they pressed out of the cluster of grapes that were then presented 
at the Lord's table. All which they condemn, and order ■ that nothing but bread, 
and wine mingled with water, should be offered, according to the determination 
of the ancient councils.'" The words printed above in italics are Bingham's 
translation of the words of the council — viz., quosdam etiam expressum vinum in 
sacramento Doi?iinici calicis offerre, 'some even present wine expressed in the 
sacrament of the Lord's cup.' Passing by the curious fact that non, 'not,' before 
expressum is given by some MSS. as the reading of the passage, it is obvious that 
the objection of the council had not respect to the unfermented nature of the 
juice distinctly called vinum — 'wine,' — but to the juice of the grape being 
expressed at the time of the sacrament, when no provision was made for the 
canonical admixture with water. But Pope Julius, or whoever wrote the Epistle 
to the Egyptians preserved by Gratian, had long before said, with an eye to this 
objection, Sed si necesse sit botrus in calice co?nprimatur, et aqua miscatur, 'but 
if needful let the bunch of grapes be pressed into the cup, and let water be 
mingled with it.' Thomas Aquinas alludes to this; see Note on p. 285. 

8. The objection of the late Archdeacon Tattam, that only the Abyssinian, 
amongst all the Eastern branches of the Church universal, supports the doctrine of 
the Abstainer, is the exact contrary of the fact. Hardly any church but the cor- 
rupted, intolerant, and persecuting churches of the West ever introduced any 
other practice than that of the Abstainer. [Consult Student's Edition of Dr 
Nott's 'Lectures on Bible Temperance,' p. 227, Appendix D, in reply to Dr 
Tattam; 'Works of Dr Lees,' vol. ii. pp. 131, 180; and see under II. division, 
No. 4, farther on.] 

II. The arguments in favor of the position that the Saviour used the unfer- 
mented ' fruit of the vine ' may be thus summarized : — 

I. Obedience to the Mosaic law required the absence of all fermented articles 
from the passover feast. The law forbade seor — yeast, ferment, whatever could 
excite fermentation — and khahmatz, whatever had undergone fermentation or 
been subject to the action of 2, seor. [See Note on Exod. xii. 15, 19.] Fer- 
mented grape-juice must, therefore, by the necessity of the case, have been equally 
interdicted with fermented bread. Most noteworthy is it that Maimonides, Barte- 
nora, and other mediaeval rabbins, in allowing the use of intoxicating wine, defend 
their permission by supposing that it is not fermented. They say, "It is an 
hypothesis of the Jews that the water of fruits does not ferment; hence the prohi- 
bition does not apply to pure water and to wine." In other words, to excuse a 
violation of the letter of the Divine law, rabbinism sets up a proposition which is 
a plain contradiction of natural law ! If grape-juice does not ferment, whence 
did the rabbins suppose its intoxicating power was derived ? It is hardly possible 



MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 28 1 

to stretch our charity so as to believe that the assertion was ever put forth in good 
faith. An attempted distinction between the ferment of grain and the ferment of 
grape-juice is not a whit more defensible; for (1) all ferment was forbidden, and 
(2) the ferment (yeast) of grain and of grape-juice is chemically identical, both 
being rotting albumen. Nor can it be pretended that ferment only, and not the 
spirituous product of ferment, was prohibited ; for the Gemara and rabbins forbade 
all fermented liquor of grain, however well fined; and, moreover, rum and all 
distilled spirits which are quite fme from seor have been always rigidly interdicted. 
Besides, it must have be«n practically impossible for the Jews to retain large quan- 
tities of fermented wine on their premises without a considerable portion of the 
ferment remaining attached to skins and casks. We here reach the last pinch of 
the argument Did the Saviour understand the law, or did He not? Did He 
observe the law, or break it ? If He used fermented liquor, He must, either 
ignorantly or intentionally, have broken it ; and reverence for their Master ought 
surely to lead Christians to the conclusion that the cup He ' blessed ' and gave to 
His disciples contained nothing which the law of Moses had interdicted. 

2. The consistency and beauty of the sacramental symbol demanded the absence 
of all fermented drink. Leaven had been used by the Great Teacher as an emblem 
of the doctrine of the Pharisees ; and both among Jews and heathens ferment was 
a common sign of corruption. The Lord of the dispensation of grace, who was 
now about to seal the new covenant by His blood, offers the cup as the type and 
token of that blood : could grape-juice which had been subject to a decaying and 
fermenting process be fitly and consistently used as its visible symbol? Could 
that blood, signifying the redemption of man and the cleansing of the conscience, 
be aptly represented by an intoxicating cup, which, in the Psalms and prophets, 
had been adopted, on the one hand, as the figure of human depravity, and, on the 
other, as the emblem of Divine indignation ? 

3. If the traditions of the Talmud correctly state that each person at the pass- 
over was supplied with four cups at least, and had permission to take an extra 
quantity between; and if the Saviour kept the passover, according to this custom, 
with His disciples, — unless we assume the absence of fermented liquors, the 
inference is inevitable, that both the Lord and His followers countenanced and 
illustrated alcoholic excess! Each cup, says Lightfoot (vol. ix. p. 151), was 
to contain "not less than the fourth part of a quarter of a hin, besides what water 
was mingled with it" ; and as the hin contained twelve English pints, the quantity 
of wine which it was obligatory upon each person to drink would be three pints ; 
but three pints of alcoholic wine would be sufficient to make any person, save a 
hardened toper, grossly intoxicated. Even if the Talmud be accused of extrava- 
gance, and the quantity is reduced one-half, nine out of ten persons who drank it, 
and all women and children, would be inebriated. Indeed, to suppose any sort of 
wine to be freely drunk, except an zmfermented species, is to presuppose conse- 
quences from which the truly pious mind instinctively recoils.* 



* Hence the confusion of thought evinced in the sentence preceding the quotation (given on 
p. 139) from the Evangelical Magazine (No. 103, Ne\T Series), — " All Protestants strongly resent 
the usage of the Church of Rome in denying the cup to the laity; but though we have received 
and restored to the people the visible symbol which for many centuries had been withheld from 
them, it is not quite certain that we have permitted ourselves to apprehend its meaning. We still 
celebrate the Lord's Stepper as if th» wine were forbidden us." This implies that the quantity 
used is much too small, and that it should be supped, not sipped. But would the writer of this 
complaint recommend that each communicant should receive the Talmudic allowance of a bottle 
and a half of intoxicating wine ? Is it not clear, that so long as alcoholic wine is used, the only 
condition of safety is limiting the amount to a mouthful? and that the wine of the Supper can 
never be taken copiously and festally till it ceases to be alcoholic and inebriating ? 

36 



282 MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 

4. As subsidiary evidence, we may cite the long-established practice of nearly 
all the Christian communities of the East, though widely separated from each 
other. Baron Tavernier, in his ' Persian Travels ' (1652), says of the Christians of 
St John, whom he found very numerous at ' Balsara ' (Bassorah), " In the 
eucharist they make use of meal or flour, kneaded up with wine and oil ; for, say 
they, the body of Christ being composed of two principal parts, flesh and 
blood, the flour and the wine do perfectly represent them. To make their wine 
they take grapes dried in the sun — which they call in their language zebibes, — and 
casting water upon them, let them steep for so long a time. The same wine they 
use in the consecration of the cup." The Christians of St Thomas, who were 
found on the coast of Malabar, and claimed to have derived the gospel from St 
Thomas the apostle, celebrated the Lord's Supper in the juice expressed from 
raisins 'softened one night in water,' says Odoard Barbosa. 'They use in their 
sacrifices wine prepared from dried grapes ' {vino et passis uvis confecto in sacrificiis 
utuntur), states Osorius (De Rebus, 1586). Ainsworth, in his ' Travels in Asia 
Minor' (London, 1842), notes the administration of the sacrament among the 
Nestorians, and adds, 'Raisin water supplied the place of wine.' Tischendorf, 
in his narrative of visits to the Coptic monasteries of Egypt, remarks that at the 
eucharist the priest took the thick juice of the grape from a glass with a spoon ; 
and Dr Gobat (the Protestant Bishop of Jerusalem), in his Abyssinian 'Journal,' 
records the reception of ' some bottles of grape wine. The wine is the juice of 
dried grapes with water.' It is morally certain that the eucharistical notices of 
some of the ancient Christian sects, who are represented as denouncing wine and 
rejecting it from the Lord's Supper, are colored and perverted statements, — 
pointing simply to a refusal to v&z fermented wine in the sacrament. When so able 
and acute a theologian as St Augustine charges his old associates, the Manichseans, 
with inconsistency because they condemned intoxicating wine and yet allowed the 
use of grapes, it is difficult to estimate the capacity for blundering in lesser minds 
upon the kindred question of the wine used by the independent sects of antiquity; 
some of whom may have been very wrong in respect to articles of faith, and very 
right in points of discipline and practice. 

5. In spite of the sophisms of many celebrated doctors, the Jews of the syna- 
gogue do conform very extensively to the Mosaic injunction to celebrate the pass- 
over without fermented drinks. Speaking no doubt from his own observation, the 
Rev. C. F. Frey, a converted Jew and author of several Hebrew works, has said, 
"Nor dare they (the Jews) drink any liquor made from grain, nor any that has 
passed through the process of fermentation." The Arbah Turim, a digest of 
Talmudic law, by Rabbi Jacob ben Asher, in the thirteenth century, says of the 
four cups, "If needful, he must sell what he has, in order to keep the injunction 
of the wise men. Let him sell what he has, until he procure yayin ov zimmooqim 
— wine or raisins." The learned Rabbi Manasseh ben Israel, in his Vindicia 
yudceorum (Amsterdam, 1656), says of the passover, " Here, at this feast, every 
confection [ = matzoth] ought to be so pure as not to admit of any ferment, or of 
anything that will readily fermentate'''' (Sect, i., No. 4). Mr. Noah, a leading 
Jew of New York, informed Mr Delavan that the use of wine prepared from 
steeped raisins was general among American Jews. Mr A. C. Isaacs, a teacher 
of the Jews, among whom he had lived twenty-six years before his conversion, 
stated in a letter (1844), "All the Jews with whom I have ever been acquainted 
use wwintoxicating wine at the passover, — a wine made in this country expressly 
for the occasion, and generally by themselves. Some raisins (dried grapes) are 
steeped in water for a few days previous to the passover, the vessel being placed 



MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 283 

near the fire. This liquor is bottled off, and used at the feast of unleavened bread 
as 'the fruit of the vine.' Sometimes, when time does not permit of steeping, the 
raisins are boiled on the same day on which the feast is to be celebrated at night ; 
and when the whole of the saccharine matter is thought to be extracted, the decoc- 
tion is bottled off and corked; and this is the passover wine." Dr Cunningham, 
the learned Hebraist, says, "What is now chiefly used by the Jews at the pass- 
over for wine is a drink made of an infusion of raisins in water, which is either 
boiled at once or simmered during several days. It is free from alcohol and 
acidity. It is quite sweet. I have tasted it at the paschal table. No Jew with 
whom I have conversed, of whatever class or nation, ever used any other kind. 
But a Mr Jonas informed me that he believed the proper kind of wine is that 
expressed from the red grape at the time." In Home's 'Introduction to the 
Scriptures' it is said (voL iii. p. 322, foot-note, Edit. 1846), "The modern Jews, 
being forbidden to drink any fermented liquor at the passover, drink either pure 
water, or a wine prepared by themselves from raisins (Allen's ' Modern Judaism,' 
p. 394; the Truth-Seeker, 1845, p. 78). It is not known when the Jewish custom 
began of excluding fermented wine from the passover feast. It is, however, very 
ancient, and is now almost universal among the modern Jews." The late Professor 
Moses Stuart, in the Bibliotheca Sacra (voi. i.), remarks, "I cannot doubt that 
khamats, in its widest sense, was excluded from the Jewish passover when the 
Lord's Supper was first instituted; for I am not able to find evidence to make me 
doubt that the custom among the Jews, of excluding fermented wine as well as 
(fermented) bread, is older than the Christian era. . . . That this custom is 
very ancient; that it is even now almost universal; and that it has been so for 
time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary, I take to be facts 
that cannot be fairly controverted." The Encyclopedia Britannica observes, that 
*' considerable dispute has been raised as to whether the wine used on the occasion 
was fermented or unfermented — was the ordinary wine, in short, or the pure juice 
of the grape. Those who hold that it was unfermented, appeal mainly to the 
expression 'unfermented-things,' which is the true rendering of the word trans- 
lated 'unleavened bread.' The rabbins would seem to have interpreted the com- 
mand xespecting ferment as extending to the wine as well as to the bread of the 
passover. The modern Jews, accordingly, generally use raisin wine, after the 
injunction of the rabbins " (Art. 'Passover,' 8th Edit.). The Jews may, indeed, 
differ in their practice, as the rabbins have differed in their opinions; but, un- 
questionably, multitudes consider that a regard to the Mosaic prescription 
requires them to exclude fermented liquor of all kinds from their dwellings during 
the passover, and to celebrate that feast in wine of a perfectly unintoxicating 
character. 



It may be inferred from the evangelical history, that, in the time of our Lord, 
the custom of using ' the fruit of the vine ' at the passover had become general. 
As it is not named by Moses in his regulations for the observance of that feast, we 
may presume that it was introduced after his day, perhaps after the captivity. 
Whenever introduced, however, this 'fruit of the vine' would fall under the 
general principle prohibiting both the use and presence of ferment during the 
passover week, from the 14th to the 21st of the month Nisan. The wine thus 
employed would, therefore, be composed (1) of grape-juice squeezed at the 
passover feast — perhaps from the grape yielding a red, sweet juice, — and drunk 
immediately after straining; or (2) of grape-juice previously boiled down, and 



284 MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 2Q. 

reconverted into a potable liquid at the table by water, hot or cold (hot is men- 
tioned in the Mishna) ; or (3) of the juice of raisins which had been kept steeped 
and simmering in readiness for the occasion. 

If the order of proceeding described in the Mishna was followed by the Lord 
and His apostles, the following would be the course of events : — The company 
being seated, the Lord, acting as master of the feast, took the first cup of wine, 
and having pronounced a blessing, such as " We thank Thee, O Lord, our heavenly 
Father, who hast created the fruit of the vine," He drank of the cup, and gave it to 
the disciples that they might also partake. The hands of all were then washed, 
and the table was furnished with the paschal lamb roasted whole, with bitter herbs, 
two unleavened cakes, the remains of the peace offerings presented on the pre- 
ceding day, and the charoseth or thick-sauce. A piece of salad was then taken 
and eaten, and a blessing pronounced on the herbs ; * after which, the provisions 
having been temporarily removed or permitted to remain (as no children or strangers 
were present), conversation followed upon the origin of the feast; the supper 
(if removed) was then replaced, and water having been mingled with the second 
cup of wine, " He saith unto them, With desire have I desired to eat this pascha 
with you before I suffer ; for I say unto you, I shall no more eat thereof until it be 
fulfilled in the kingdom of God. And He took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, 
Take this and divide among you ; I will not henceforth drink of the fruit of the 
vine until the kingdom of God shall come." The 113th and 114th Psalms having 
been read, the second cup of wine, distributed to each, was drunk. Hands were 
again washed, an ejaculatory prayer uttered, and one of the unleavened cakes 
blessed and broken, and a piece offered to each disciple. This was eaten with 
the bitter herbs, the bread being dipped into the sauce. " And as they were eating, 
He said, Verily I say unto you, that one of you shall betray Me. And they were 
very sorry, and began each of them to say unto Him, Lord, is it I ? And He 
answered and said, He who dippeth his hand with Me in this dish, he will betray 
Me." Dipping a sop into the dish, the Saviour gave it to Judas. The flesh of the 
peace-offerings was then eaten, a benediction pronounced, and the paschal lamb 
served. "And as they were eating, Jesus took the bread (the second unleavened 
cake), and blessed and brake it, and gave it to His disciples, and said, Take ; this is 
My body, which is given for you : this do in remembrance of Me." Thanks were 
offered, hands were again washed, and 'the cup of blessing' prepared, which 
received a new and exalted significance, for "after the same manner also He took 
the cup after supper, and having given thanks, gave it to them, saying, Drink all 
of you out of it ; for this is My blood of the covenant, which is shed for many for 
the forgiveness of sins. But I say unto you, I shall not drink henceforth of this fruit 
of the vine, until that day I drink it new with you in My Father's kingdom." The 
allusion to God's kingdom touched a chord of ambition in the disciples' breasts, 
and they discussed who should be the greatest in it. This self-exalting disposition 
was reproved, and Peter was warned. The wonderful and mysterious discourse re- 
corded by John was then commenced, and carried on down to the words (chap. xiv. 31), 
'Arise, let us go hence.' The fourth cup of wine was then filled, and the grand 



*The language of the 'blessings' was very precise, nicely distinguishing between natural and 
manufactured things. For example : — For fruit which grows upon a tree, say, Who ' createst 
the fruit of the tree ' ; save for wine, whereon the benediction is, ' Who createst the fruit of the vine? 
For things which derive not their growth immediately from the ground (Psa. civ. 14, 15), say, 
'Who gave being to all things.' "—(Mishna, Tr. Berakoth, vi.) Let it be remembered, that though 
no one would think of calling vinegar the ' fruit of the vine,' it is really more deserving that 
appellation than any form of alcohol. The former is sometimes found in growing fruit, the latter 



MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 285 

hallel or hymn of praise — comprehending Psalms cxvi. to cxviii. — having been 
sung, the disciples drank of ' the fruit of the vine ' ; and the company having passed 
into the open air and out of Jerusalem, the Saviour resumed His discourse, 
with an implied reference to what had been last done in the passover chamber ; 
as if saying, " Ye have been drinking of the fruit of the vine, but reme7nber ! * I am 
the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman.' " 



The principal reasons for a use of unfermented wine in the present day, at the 
Sacramental communion, may be briefly enumerated: — 

1. Unfermented wine, if the preceding arguments are valid, was used by the Lord 
when instituting the Supper, conformably to a law, the moral significance of 
which remains the same, and is even greatly enhanced ; for if ferment, the symbol 
of corruption and insincerity, was out of place at the passover, how much more 
unsuitable is it at the board of Christian fellowship and joy ! It may be answered 
that conformity to the old analogy requires the disuse of fermented bread ; and why 
should the conformity not be complete ? Yet partial conformity is better than total 
contrariety; and if the conformity must be partial, there are special reasons 
(afterwards assigned) why the cup should be selected, — not to insist on the fact that 
in fermented wine the effects of the ferment remain, while in bread they have been 
expelled by the heat of baking. 

2. Unfermented wine is, in literal truth and beyond all question, the only ' fruit 
of the vine.' That designation it may challenge without fear of contradic- 
tion. What the vine has made it by vital processes, and what earth, sun, and air 
have combined to make it by the genial chemistry of absorption, warmth, and 
nutrition, it has become.* Fermented wine, on the contrary, is, just so far as its 
fermented and alcoholic character goes, something quite other than the * fruit ' of the 
vine, — the result of disintegrating forces which do not operate upon the vine, or 
within the grape, as formed by the Creator.! One practice, therefore, is at least 
right, while the other may be wrong, since the juice of the grape must be the fruit 
of the vine, whereas the wine of commerce cannot be so entirely, and may not be 
so in any degree. Under such circumstances, who can decide in favor of the 
latter, and against the former, as the substance which Christians are commanded 
to use in remembrance of their Lord ? 

3. Unfermented wine, on account of its innocent and nutritious properties, is a 
proper symbol of the blood of the Redeemer shed for the remission of sins. But 
fermented wine is almost destitute of any nutritious property, and, as containing 
the invisible but potent spirit of mischief, is, in proportion to its alcoholic strength, 
more fitted to represent moral disease and guilt than pardon and purification. 
This inversion of all analogy becomes the more serious when almost all the wines 
sold are charged with brandy, and are otherwise adulterated, so as more to resemble 

* The schoolmen, with all their acumen, did not dream of denying so plain a fact. The works 
of Thomas Aquinas are contained entire in Migne's Patrologue Cursus Completus ; and in the 4th 
book, 74th question, and 5th article, where it is asked, in reference to the Lord's Supper, utrum 
•vinum vitis sit propria materia kujus sacramenti — ' whether wine of the vine is a proper sub- 
stance to be used in this sacrament,' — he answers, Mustum autem jam habet speciem vini, 
'grape-juice has the specific nature ofwine'; and decides, Ideo de musto potest con/ici hoc sacra- 
mentum, ' therefore this sacrament can be kept with grape-juice.' He cautions against the use of 
must just expressed, on account of its turbidness ; but states that, by the decree of Pope Julius, 
si necesse fuerit botrus in calice comprimatur, ' the cluster may, if necessary, have its juice 
pressed into the cup.' [See page 280.] 

t " It is curious," says Professor Brande, in his 'Manual of Chemistry,' "how perfectly the 
exclusion of air is provided for by the natural texture of the grape, which does not allow its ingress 
although it admits of the transpiration of aqueous vapor, as is shown by the spontaneous desiccation 
of the berry." 



286 MATTHEW, XXVI. 26 — 29. 

the dreadful * mixed wine ' of Scripture than the sweet and sanctifying influences 
of Divine grace in Christ Jesus our Lord. 

4. Unfermented wine can be used by all communicants, young or old, without 
any danger of creating or of reawakening the drunkard's appetite ; while the use of 
fermented wine at the Lord's Supper has been known to rekindle the flame which 
abstinence had laid in many reformed inebriates. Surely the Lord's table ought 
not to be a place of fierce temptation to any Christian ; or a place where, for the 
soul's sake, one-half of the emblems has to be rejected by any believer — a course 
that not few reformed drunkards are compelled to follow whenever fermented 
wine is present at the Eucharist. 

5. Unfermented wine may be used by all without any scruples or qualms of 
conscience, but fermented wine cannot ; and therefore, on the broad principle of 
'not casting a stumblingblock in a brother's way,' Christians who might themselves 
(till otherwise convinced) use alcoholic wine conscientiously, should cheerfully, 
from a spirit of brotherly affection, commune in elements of which all can partake 
without danger or offence. The course taken by some Congregational officials, 
of excluding from membership those who have not been able to use alcoholic wine, 
is a violation of Christian equity and charity, an arbitrary and cruel act, which is 
self-condemned. A majority of those who have power to decide not to supply 
unfermented wine ought, at least, to allow those who desire it to have it provided 
for their separate use. A contrary course must inevitably produce division.* 

6. Unfermented wine is procurable without extending any sanction to the 
iniquitous traffic in alcoholic liquors. The fearfully injurious influence of that 
traffic upon national morals is such as to make it eminently desirable that all 
connection between it and true Christian communities should be avoided. This 
may be done with ease and satisfaction by exchanging the wine which mocks and 
deceives for the un corrupted 'fruit of the vine,' on which a blessing may be freely 
invoked without any sense of incongruity, and without exciting aversion and disgust. 
At a moderate computation, the quantity of alcohol consumed any year in Great 
Britain at the Sacramental table cannot fall short of 25,000 gallons, representing 
five times as many gallons of wine purchased, at a minimum cost of ^"75,000. 
What God has not joined may be lawfully sundered whenever a laudable purpose 
is to be attained ; and while no sacred principle binds the table of the Lord to 
the vender of intoxicating and mostly factitious wines, a separation between them 
would withdraw from that 'mystery of iniquity,' the Wine Trade, a patronage and 
implied approval which is simply shocking. Surely it is 'a consummation devoutly 
to be wished,' that the Church of God, and the sanctuary of a pure and spiritual 
worship, should be kept as free as possible from every taint of intoxication, and 
from everything that feeds and fosters the wide-spread intemperance of the 
nation. 

* Whether a Christian abstainer should take the Lord's Supper in fermented wine, when he 
must do so or not commune at all, is a question of conscience which each person must determine 
for himself. Consistency certainly requires that he should use his legitimate influence to obtain a 
substitution of pure for alcoholic wine in the communion service of his own church. Failing this, 
he may claim to be supplied with the only wine of which he can safely or conscientiously partake, 
or not to have the intoxicating cup forced upon him by the penalty of excision. The recipe for 
making passover wine is as follows : — " Take a quantity of the best bloom or Muscatel rasins ; cut 
them into small pieces ; pour on them boiling water in the proportion of a pint to every pound ; let 
the infusion stand overnight ; then press out the liquor from the fruit, adding two tea-spoonfuls of 
burnt sugar for coloring. After the whole has settled for a few hours, decant the clear wine by 
pouring slowly into the vessel to be used, leaving any sediment behind." A sufficient quantity 
of unfermented grape-juice can thus be produced at a very economical rate. Where a wine more 
scientifically prepared, and of clear and beautiful appearance, is preferred, the ' passover wine ' of 
Mr Frank Wright, of Kensington, England, can be recommended; or that of Mr Reynolds, of 
Ripley, Ohio. It is, undoubtedly, grape-juice pure and wholesome. 



MATTHEW, XXVII. 34, 48. 287 

Chapter XXVII. Verse 34. 

They gave him vinegar to drink, mingled with gall : and when he 
had tasted thefeoj \ he would not drink. 



Vinegar] Oxos y derived from oxus 'sharp,' applied to the edge of tools, and 
then to the sense of taste; hence oxos, that which tastes sharply = vinegar, sour 
wine. In Codices C and Z the passage is lost ; but Codices Aleph, B, and D have 
oinoriy 'wine.' With this reading agrees the V., vinum ; but Beza has acetum, 
' vinegar. ' Mark says ' wine. ' The obvious conclusion is, that wine which had 
undergone both the alcoholic and acetous fermentations was used, agreeably to 
the prophecy, 'In My thirst they gave Me vinegar (khometz) to drink.' [See 
Note on Psa. lxix. 20.] 

Mingled with gall] Meta cholees memigmenon. Cholee is the word by which 
the Lxx. translates the Hebrew rosh, * gall,' and taanah, ' wormwood.' The literal 
meaning is bile, gall (from ched ' to pour out ' = that which is poured out of the 
gall-bladder). It is applicable to any bitter substance, such as the myrrh referred 
to by Mark, unless by cholee is to be understood some substance associated with the 
myrrh. [See Note on Mark xv. 23.] The V. and Beza givefelle, 'with gall ' (fel), 
the Latin equivalent for cholee. 



This event is described by Matthew and Mark only. Bleeding and fainting, 
the Saviour had followed the cross, which He was unable to carry, until Golgotha 
or Calvary was reached; and then He probably exhibited so much exhaustion, 
and appeared so likely to die before crucifixion, that some pungent draught, 
composed of sour wine and bitter drugs, was presented to Him. The notion that 
this mixture was intended to deaden the pain of crucifixion is derived from a 
foregone conclusion concerning the death-cup given to criminals, but is not 
warranted by the other circumstances of the transaction, — all testifying to the 
harshness and brutality of the persons officially acting in it. The prophetic 
language of the Psalmist also excludes the thought of purposed kindness by the 
soldiery.* Perhaps, however, a drugged potion, such as was offered, would have 
somewhat deadened the nervous sensibilities, while it excited muscular action; 
but no such anodyne or ' support ' was desired by the Redeemer. ' When He had 
tasted, He would not drink,' says Matthew; while Mark more sententiously records, 
'Pie received it not.' He was to drain the cup of suffering, and He would do it 
in the possession of all his mental powers. What is fit to be done and endured, 
ought to be so, and may be, without recourse to liquors that stupefy or inflame. 



Chapter XXVII. Verse 48. 

And straightway one of them ran, and took a sponge, and filled it 
with vinegar, and put it on a reed, and gave him to drink. 



One of them] Eis ex atiton, 'one from among them.' The words ex auton 
are absent from Codex Aleph. 

* It is a tradition of the Talmud that a society of ladies existed in Jerusalem who supplied 
criminals with drugged drink, to allay the fears and pains of execution ; and one scholar has con- 
nected with this tradition the account of Luke, ' a great company of people and of women ' 
followed Jesus to Calvary, bewailing and lamenting Him. But there is no reason to ascribe to 
female sympathy the intoxicating draught offered to the Saviour. 



288 



MATTHEW, XXVII. 4&. 



A sponge] Spongon. Latin, sf 

With vinegar] Oxous. Codex D has oxou. Latin, ace to. 

Put it on a reed] Peritheis kalamo, * having placed it round a cane, — /. e. 
round the top of the cane. The calamus was 'a plant with a jointed hollow stalk, 
growing in wet ground. ' John says the sponge was put upon hyssop ; so that 
kalamos is here used for the stalk of the hyssop, which sometimes grows to the 
height of two feet. Some portion of the hyssop may have remained attached to 
the reed, so that it is spoken of as 'hyssop.' The sponge, after being soaked in 
vinegar, was raised on the point of the reed to the lips of the crucified One. The 
accounts of all the evangelists may be here compared with advantage : — 

Matt, xxvii. 48. Mark xv. 36. Luke xxiii. 36. John xix. 28 — 30. 
And straightway And one ran and And the soldiers After this, Jesus 
one of them ran, filled a sponge full also mocked him, . . . saith, I thirst, 
and took a sponge, of vinegar, and put coming to him, Now there was set 
and filled it with it on a reed, and and offering him a vessel full of vine- 
vinegar, and put it gave him to drink, vinegar. gar : and they filled 
on a reed, and a sponge with vine- 
gave him to drink, gar, and put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth. When 
Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished : 
and he bowed his head, and gave up the ghost. 

The particulars, as variously presented above, may be thus collectively repro- 
duced : — At or about the ninth hour, three in the afternoon, the Saviour, in His 
agony, uttered the awful cry, 'Eli, Eli, lama, sabachthani,' which those who 
stood by mistook for an appeal to Elias. He then added, 'I thirst.' Someone 
who heard this ran to 'a vessel,' near at hand, 'full of vinegar ' — posca, the usual 
drink of the Roman legionaries, — ' and took a sponge, and filled it with vinegar ' ; 
and then 'the soldiers,' fixing it on a 'reed' of hyssop, held it up to Him with 
1 mocking ' words, putting it ' to His mouth to drink ' ; while others, less profane 
and more curious, cried, ' Let be ' — be still, — ' let us see if Elias will come to save 
Him.' Jesus 'received the vinegar,' for the saturated sponge cooled His lips and 
relieved his burning thirst without beclouding his mind; and having cried with a 
'loud voice,' saying, ' It is finished,' He added, ' Father, into Thy hands I com- 
mend My spirit;' then 'He bowed His head,' resigning His life, and His spirit 
passed from earth into paradise. 



THE 

GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MARK. 



Chapter II. Verse 22. 



And no man putteth new wine into old bottles : else the new wine 
doth burst the bottles, and the wine is spilled, and the bottles will be 
marred : but new wine must be put into new bottles. 



And no man putteth new wine into old bottles] Kai oudeis ballei 
oinon neon eis askous palaious, ' and no one places new wine into old leathern- 



Else the new wine doth burst the bottles] Ei de mee, rheessei ho oinos 
ho neos tons askotis, 'but if not (== otherwise), the new wine rends (= bursts) the 
bags.' All the chief Codices except Codex A read rheexei, 'will burst,' and 
omit ho neos, ' the new,' having simply ho oinos. ' the wine.' 

And the wine is spilled] Kai ho oinos ekcheitai, ' and the wine is poured 
out.' Codex B has kai ho oinos apollutai, ' and the wine is lost ' (destroyed) ; Codex 
D has only kai ho oinos, 'and the wine.' 

And the bottles will be marred] Kai oi askoi apolountai, ' and the bags 
will be lost ' (destroyed). Codex B has only kai oi askoi, ' and the bags.' 

But new wine must be put into new bottles] Alia oinon neon eis askous 
kainous bleeteon, ' but new wine should be placed into new bags.' Codex D omits the 
whole clause. Codices Aleph and B omit bleeteon, ' must be placed ' ; but in Aleph 
it is supplied by a second hand. The reading of Codex A agrees throughout with 
the received Greek text; and Codex C does the same, with the exception named 
above oi rheexei, 'will burst,' for rheessei, 'bursts.' 

[For Exposition, see Note on Matt. ix. 17.] 



Chapter IX. Verse 41. 

For whosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in my name, 
because ye belong to Christ, verily I sav unto you, he shall not lose 
his reward. 



A cup of water] Potecrion hudatos, 'cup of water.' [See Note on Matt, 
x. 42.] 

37 



290 MARK, XIV. 23 — 25. 



Chapter XII. Verse i. 



And he began to speak unto them by parables. A certain man 
planted a vineyard, and set an hedge about it, and digged a place for 
the winefat, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and 
went into a far country. 



A vineyard] Ampelbna. 

And set an hedge about it] Kai perietheeke phragmon. 

And digged a place for the winefat] Kai druxen kupoleenion, 'and 
digged an under-press.' When used in distinction from leenos, 'press,' the kupo- 
leenion denoted that part of the structure into which the juice flowed after pressure 
of the grapes. Here it would seem to designate the entire receptacle for treading 
the clusters and collecting the 'new wine.' The wine-press was frequently dug 
out of the rock or soil, — precautions being taken that the liquid should not ooze 
away. 

And let it out to husbandmen] Kai exedoto auton georgois, ' and gave it 
out (i. e. on hire) to cultivators of the earth.' [See Note on Matt. xxi. 33.] 



Chapter XIV. Verses 23 — 25. 

23 And he took the cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it 
to them : and they all drank of it. 24 And he said unto them, This is 
my blood of the new testament, which is shed for many. 25 Verily I 
say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine, until that 
day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God. 



V. 23. The cup] To poteerion. All the chief MSS., except A, omit ho, 'the.' 
And they all drank of it] Kai epion ex auto pantes, ' and all drank of 
it ' — i. e. of its contents, — in response to the invitation, as recorded by St Matthew, 
piete ex autou pantes, 'drink ye all of it,' — phraseology which conveys the impres- 
sion that but one cup was used at this time, of which all the apostles (except, 
perhaps, Judas) drank in common. 

V. 24. This is my blood of the new testament] Codices Aleph B, C, 
and D omit the word kainees, ' (of the) new.' 

V. 25. I WILL DRINK NO MORE OF THE FRUIT OF THE VINE] Ouketi OU 

mee pib ek tou genneematos tees ampelou, ' no more, not at all, will I drink of the 
fruit of the vine.' All the chief MSS. read geneematos (with one n). Codex 
Aleph omits ouketi, and Codex D has ou mee prosthb pein, ' I will not add to 
drink.' 

Until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God] Hebs 
tees heemeras ekeinees, hotan auto pinb kainon en tee basileia tou Theou, ' until that 
day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God. ' 

[For Exposition, see Note on Matt. xxvi. 26 — 29.] 



MARK, XV. 23, 36. 29I 



Chapter XV. Verse 23. 

And they gave him to drink wine mingled with myrrh : but he 
received it not. 



To drink] Piein, 'to drink.' This word is absent from Codices Aleph, B, 
andC. 

Wine mingled with myrrh] Esmumismenon oinon, * smyrnized wine '= 
wine prepared or flavored with myrrh. Smurna or myrrha (from the Hebrew 
tnor) is said, in Robinson's N. Test. Lexicon, to be "a substance distilling in 
tears (drops), spontaneously or by incisions, from a small thorny tree growing in 
Arabia, and especially in Abyssinia : these tears soon harden into a bitter aromatic 
gum, which was highly prized by the ancients, and used as incense and perfume." 
Very little is known of the myrrh-plant even at the present day. In the Baby- 
lonian Talmud, Rabbi Chusda is quoted as saying, "He who is led to death has 
given to him to drink a grain of myrrh (or frankincense) in a cup of wine, that his 
mind onay be withdrawn from the sense of his situation." But the historical 
evidence in support of this statement is exceedingly slender and obscure. [See 
Note on Matt, xxvii. 34. ] 



Chapter XV. Verse 36. 

And one ran and filled a sponge full of vinegar, and put it on a 
reed, and gave him to drink, saying, Let alone j let us see whether 
Elias will come to take him down. 



One] Eis, 'one (man).' Codices Aleph and B read tis, 'a certain (man).' 
Filled a sponge] Gemisas spongon, 'making a sponge full." Codex D has 

pleesas spongon, 'filling a sponge.' 

Put it on A reed] Peritheis te kalamo, 'and having placed it round a reed.' 

Codex D has epilheis, 'having placed it upon.' [See Note on Matt, xxvii. 48.] 



THE 

GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE. 



Chapter I. Verse 15. 

For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord, and shall drink 
neither wine nor strong drink ; and he shall be filled with the Holy 
Ghost, even from his mother's womb. 



And shall drink neither wine nor strong drink] Kai oinon kai sikera 
ou mee piee, 'and wine and strong drink he may not surely drink.' Wiclif (1380) 
translates, ' and he schal not drynke wyn ne sider ' (cider). The Rheims version 
(1582) has 'and wine and sicer he shal not drinke.' 



John the Baptist was to be 'great in the sight of the Lord,' and to be 
' filled with the Holy Ghost ' from his birth. Called to a work of extraordinary 
solemnity, he was through life to be a Nazarite, — the principal feature of whose 
vow and regimen is quoted by the angel. If, as a matter of physical support, 
alcohol would have conduced (as nothing else could) to the performance of his 
onerous labors, it is inconceivable that he should have been deprived of it. [As 
to the contrast between the Baptist and the Saviour, see Note on Matt. xi. 18, 19; 
and on the relation of abstinence to spiritual influence, see Note on Ephes. v. 18.] 

The comparison between John the Baptist, as the harbinger of Christ, and Tem- 
perance societies, as pioneers of Christian civilization, has often been drawn, and in- 
volves both a significant truth and an impressive argument, if properly defined. No 
preparatory work can equal in importance that of making those sober to whom 
the Gospel is preached, in order that it may be heard by them to purpose. 
And if this preparatory work does not belong to Christians, upon whom does it 
devolve ? At the same time it ought to be borne in mind, and always urged, that 
John's example does not furnish so strong a reason for abstinence as do the 
benevolent and self-denying principles of Christianity, illustrated by the transcendent 
pattern of His self-sacrifice whose shoes' latchet John confessed he was not worthy 
to unloose. [See Note on chap. ix. 23.] 



Chapter III. Verse i. 



Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius 
Pilate being governor of Judaea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, 



luke, v. 37—39- 293 



and his brother Philip tetrach of Ituraea and of the region of 
Trachonitis, and Lysanias the tetrarch of Abilene. 



Tiberius Cesar] This was the Emperor Tiberius Claudius Drusus Nero, the 
step-son and successor of Augustus, who ruled the Roman empire from A.D.14 — 37* 
Seneca says of him, that he was never drunk but once in his life ; for having once 
begun to drink, he never ceased drinking till his death. This description is 
scarcely chargeable with extravagance when compared with the more exact account 
given of him by Suetonius : — "When a young soldier in the camp, he was re- 
markable for his excessive inclination to wine. For Tiberius they called him 
Biberius [bibber], for Claudius, Caldius [hot], and for Nero, Mero [neat (wine)]. 
And after he succeeded to the empire, and was invested with the office of reforming 
the morality of the people, he spent the whole night and two days together in 
feasting and drinking with Pomponius Flaccus and Lucius Piso, to one of whom he 
immediately gave the province of Syria, and to the other the prefecture of the city, 
pronouncing them in his letters patent to be ' very pleasant companions and friends, 
fit for all occasions.' He preferred a very ignoble candidate for the quaestorship 
before the most noble competitors, simply because he had swallowed an amphora 
of wine at a draught." This 'amphora' must have been of lesser size than the 
common sort, which held about eight English gallons. The other vices of Tiberius 
were in keeping with his chronic inebriation. 



Chapter V. Verses 37 — 39. 

37 And no man putteth new wine into old bottles; else the new 
wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled, and the bottles shall perish. 

38 But new wine must be put into new bottles ; and both are preserved. 

39 No man also having drunk old wine straightway desireth new ; for 
he saith, The old is better. 



V. 37. And no man putteth new wine into old bottles] Kai oudeis 
ballei oinon neon eis askous palaious, * and no one places new wine into old bags.' 
Codex C has epiballei, ' places upon,' an obvious reiteration, by mistake, of epiballei 
in ver. 36, where it is appropriate. 

Else the new wine will burst the bottles] Ei de meege, rheexei ho neos 
oinos tous askous, 'otherwise, the new wine will rend the bag.' Codex C has 
rkeessei, * rends ' ; Codex Aleph omits neos, reading ' the wine will rend the bags ' ; 
Codex D repeats the word 'old' — 'the old new-wine will rend the old bags.' 

And be spilled, and the bottles shall perish] Kai autos ekchutheesetai, 
kai hoi askoi apolountai, * and it will be poured out ( = spilled), and the bottles 
will perish.' 

V. 38. But new wine must be put into new bottles; and both are 
preserved] Alia oinon neon eis askous kainous bleeteon, kai amphoteroi sunteerountai, 
' but (it is fit for) new wine to be placed into new bags, and both are kept together 
(= preserved).' In Codex Aleph bleeteon is substituted by a second hand for 
ballousin ; and Codex C, instead of bleeteon, reads ballousin, ' they place ' new 
wine, etc., and substitutes teerountai, ' they are kept,' for sunteerountai. Codices 
Aleph and B omit altogether the words kai amphoteroi sunteerountai. 



2Q4 LUKE, V. 37—39- 



V. 39. NO MAN ALSO HAVING DRUNK OLD WINE STRAIGHTWAY DESIRETH 

NEW] Kai oudeis pion palaion, eutheos thelei neon, ' and no one drinking old 
immediately wishes new.' The word oinon, 'wine,' is to be understood after both 
palaion and neon. Codices Aleph and B omit kai, ' and,' and eutheos, 'immediately.' 
Codex C omits etitheos. 

For he saith, The old is better] Legei gar ho palaios chreestoteros estin, 
* for he affirms, The old is better. ' Codices Aleph and B have, instead of chreestoteros, 
'better,' chreestos, 'good' — suitable — 'good enough' (Alford). 

The received Greek text of these three verses agrees verbatim with the text of 
Codex A. The V. renders chreestoteros by melius, ' better ' ; Beza by utilius, 
'more useful.' Verses 37 and 38 agree in the corresponding passages of the 
Gospels of Matthew and Mark; and for an explanation of them, see Note on 
Matt. ix. 17. Ver. 39 is peculiar to Luke's Gospel, and is even absent from the 
text of Luke as presented in Codex D ; but the preponderance of evidence is in 
favor of its genuineness. 



The whole passage is part of the Saviour's reply to the question why His 
disciples did not fast as did the disciples of John and the Pharisees; and is 
generally interpreted to signify that it was not judicious to impose trials too heavy 
upon young disciples, but that there must be an adaptation of discipline to ex- 
perience ; in other words, that the law of congruity must be regarded, as in the 
case of those who avoided putting new wine into old bottles. But the commentators 
are puzzled to trace any connection between this exposition and ver. 39, where 
the drinker of old wine affirms its superiority over new. We may, perhaps, find 
the link of connection in the idea that new wine, preserved by close confinement in 
new bottles till it is old, retains in perfection all its original properties, and acquires 
a lusciousness that enhances its value to the user.* The language may, therefore, 
be thus paraphrased: — "You ask why My disciples do not act as do the disciples 
of John and the Pharisees. You forget that the spirit of My dispensation — a spirit 
of sacred liberty — is essentially different from theirs, and, therefore, that the 
regulations affecting its subjects must also differ. If put into the bottles of 
traditional Judaism, it would acquire a fermentative violence that would burst the 
traditional bands, and endanger its own religious existence, by the change of liberty 
into license. Such rules as are required for My dispensation must be adapted to 
its spirit — the bottles must correspond with the contents, — and so both will be 
preserved, — the spiritual liberty and the conditions under which it is held. Thus 
preserved from contamination and fermentation, the older it becomes, the sweeter 
and purer it will be ; and as no one who drinks old wine that has been safely kept 
desires new wine, because he declares that the old is better, so, the longer the 
liberty I bring is possessed in conformity with the principles I inculcate, the more 
assuredly will its excellence be exhibited and approved." (If the old wine of ver. 
39 is taken as symbolical of the old form of Judaism, the remark 'No one,' etc., as 
Alford suggests, is simply declaratory of the self-satisfaction of the rabbinical Jew 
with his doctrines and rites.) Hence — 



*Mr Wright's passover wine is found to improve in flavor by keeping, though no chemical 
change, and certainly no fermentation, occurs. An explanation may be found in the fact that the 
original aromas of the grape, fine and subtle particles, being, by the act of crushing, mingled with 
the saccharine and albuminous matters, become less perceptible to the palate ; but, by being kept, 
they mechanically separate again, and so impart a fuller and distincter flavor by first touchiug 
the nerves of taste. 



LUKE, IX. 23. 295 



1. The Lord does not introduce incongruous or contradictory metaphors. 

2. Nor does He assign to old fermented wine a superiority over new and unfer- 
mented wine. But, — 

3. A consistent sense is elicited by considering the ' new wine ' of ver. 38 iden- 
tical in nature, and representative of the same Christian blessings, with the • old 
wine ' of ver. 39 — being the new preserved and improved by age. Historically, it 
is unquestionable that many of the oldest wines, and such as were most esteemed, 
acquired a honeyed thickness and sweetness that made their extreme dilution 
imperative, in order to their being drunk. Aristotle testifies that the wines of 
Arcadia were so thick that they dried up in the goat-skins, and that it was the 
practice to scrape them off and dissolve the scrapings in water.* Some of the 
celebrated Opimian wine mentioned by Pliny had, in his day, two centuries after 
its production, the consistence of honey.t Professor Donovan says, "In order 
to preserve their wines to these ages, the Romans concentrated the must or grape- 
juice, of which they were made, by evaporation, either spontaneous in the air or 
over a fire, and so much so as to render them thick and syrupy." % 



Chapter VII. Verses 33 — 35. 

33 For John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking 
wine ; and ye say, He hath a devil. 34 The Son of man is come eating 
and drinking; and ye say, Behold a gluttonous man, and a wine- 
bibber, a friend of publicans and sinners ! 35 But wisdom is justified 
of all her children. 



V. 33. Neither eating bread nor drinking wine] Meete arton esthion, 
meete oinon pinon. 

V. 34. A winebibber] Oinopotees, ' wine-drinker ' ; the V. and Beza, bibens 
vinum, ' drinking wine. ' Wiclif has ' drynkynge wiyn ' ; Tyndale, ' a drinker of 
wyne.' 

V. 35. But wisdom is justified of all her children] Kai edikaiothee 
hee sophia apo ton teknon hautees panton, ' and wisdom is vindicated (shown to be 
just) by all her offspring.' Codex Aleph, instead of teknon, has ergon, 'works.' 
In Codex D, panton, ' all,' is absent. 

[For Exposition, see Note on the parallel text, Matt. xi. 18, 19.] 



Chapter IX. Verse 23. 

And he said to them all, If any man will come after me, let him 
deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me. 



This is one of many texts in which we find a wonderful condensation of the 
great tests and principles of the Christian life. Self-conquest and self-control are 
both involved, — the denial of all that is sensual and vicious, the doing of all that 
is virtuous. In the 'battle of life,' not only must we encounter and overthrow 

* Meteorolog. iv. 10. f Nat. Hist. xiv. 6. 

X ' Domestic Economy,' in Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopaedia. 



296 LUKE, X. 7, 34. 



every enemy, but we must prove our profession and possession of Christian grace 
by acts of beneficence and sympathy, — by conduct adapted to the circumstances 
in which we live, and the necessities of the people around us. How sad it is to see, 
on the contrary, general professions of Christian zeal and sacrifice, with no con- 
crete illustrations of their reality ! Whole congregations will sing, with apparent 
heartiness, but really without any thought at all of the application of these 

words, — 

" When I survey the wondrous cross 
On which the Prince of glory died, 
My richest gains I count but loss, 
And pour contempt on all my pride. 



Were the whole realms of nature mine, 
That were a present far too small ; 

Love so amazing, so divine, 
Demands my soul, my life, my all I " 



But how many would give up their little glass of ale or wine to accomplish the 
reclamation of many drunkards, and secure the salvation of many souls ? 

" Some cursed thing unknown 
Must surely lurk within ; 
Some idol which I will not own, 
Some secret lust or sin." 

The Christian hope, which looks forward to the possession of a glorious spiritual 
(or psychical) body, should induce us to adopt abstinence as the means of partially 
purifying the body we now have, that, as St Augustine says of the resurrection- 
body, "with perfect and most wondrous facility of obedience it will be subject to 
the Spirit, so as completely to fulfill the serenely calm volitions of a never-ending 
life" ('City of God,' lib. xiii. cap. 23). 



Chapter X. Verse 7. 

And in the same house remain, eating and drinking such things as 
they give : for the laborer is worthy of his hire. Go not from house 
to house. 



Eating and drinking such things as they give] Esthiontes kai pinontes 
ta par" auton, 'eating and drinking the (things) from them.' 



To infer from this command that the Lord's first disciples were required, or that 
Christians now are bound or permitted, to consume whatever is presented to them, 
without regard to its fitness as food, is to sacrifice reason to a most absurd literal 
interpretation of Scripture ; yet even this inference has been drawn, and constructed 
into an objection to the disuse of intoxicating liquors ! The objectors, however, 
would never apply it to things they disliked. 



Chapter X. Verse 34. 

And went to him, and bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and 
wine, and set him on his own beast, and brought him to an inn, and 
took care of him. 



LUKE, X. 36, 37. 297 



Pouring in oil and wine] Epicheon elaion kai oinon, 'pouring upon (them) 
oil and wine.' The oil would act as an emollient, the wine as an astringent. 
When fermented wine was used in such cases, the virtue of the application could 
not reside in the alcohol present, whose only effect would be to increase the inflam- 
matory condition of the wounds. Hence, in modern battle-fields, nothing has 
been found superior to simple lint and cooling water for wounds = wet bandages. 
It has been conjectured that the reference is to a compound of oil and wine, called 
by Galen oinelaion, 'wine-oil'; and noticed by Africanus (' Geoponics,' book x. 
chap. 49) as applied to branches of fig trees after pruning, probably to prevent 
the effusion of the sap. Pliny, in his ' Natural History ' (book xv. chap. 7), in 
describing medicated oils and unguents, names the oleum gleucinicm, compounded 
of sweet wine (gleukos) and oil. Columella's recipe for making this article is 
given in his 12th book, chap. 51. The passage is translated at length in Tirosh lo 
Yayin ; * but the sum is — "To about ninety pints of the best must in a barrel, 
eighty lbs. of oil are to be added, and a small bag of spices sunk to the place 
where the oil and wine meet ; the oil to be poured off on the ninth day. The spices 
in the bag are then to be pounded and replaced, filling up the cask with another 
eighty lbs. of oil; this oil to be drawn off after seven days." This text has been 
read by some devotees of strong drink as if the oil were designed for the wounds 
and the wine for the stomach of the wounded traveler ! — much in the same way 
as ' the brandy-and-salt ' embrocation (once a popular form of quackery) was 
divided by some Bacchanalians into two parts, — the salt being rubbed upon the 
surface of the body, the brandy reserved for internal application ! 



Chapter X. Verses 36, 37. 

36 Which now of these three, thinkest thou, was neighbor unto him 
that fell among the thieves ? 37 And he said, He that showed mercy 
on him. Then said Jesus unto him, Go, and do thou likewise. 



The parable of the Good Samaritan has charmed and edified sixty generations 
of Christian disciples ; and the personal summing up, ' Go thou and do like- 
wise,' remains, and ever must remain, in universal force. Topographically and 
outwardly, those are our neighbors, who live round about us ; sympathetically 
and vitally, we are neighbors — and discharge our obligations as neighbors — to 
those whom we help according to the measure of their needs and our opportunity. 
The slaves of strong drink, and the sufferers associated with these victims, abound 
i'n every quarter, and are seen on every hand ; and if this parable has any bearing 
on social evils at all, it must be viewed, — 

First, as condemning — 

( 1 ) All measures, whether public or private, by which the love of intoxicating 
liquor is excited and intensified, and the number of its spoiled and wounded victims 
increased. 

(2) Mere simple observation of this evil, mere abstract pity for the sufferers, if 
unaccompanied by efforts for their relief. Benevolent ' sentiment,' separated from 

* This treatise is now accessible only in the Appendix to * Works of Dr Lees,' vol. ii. 

38 



298 LUKE, XII. 19, 45. 



benevolent sense, is branded with the Divine disapprobation ; and not least, but 
most, where it is evidenced by persons of religious profession and ecclesiastical 
position — 'the priest and the Levite.' 

Secondly, as approving — 

(•1) The adoption of the most direct and effective action for the benefit of those 
who are overcome by strong drink. And no means can be so direct, certainly 
none have proved so effective, as those which have sought the exclusion of intoxi- 
cating liquor from the social sphere. 

(2) The exhibition of such conduct by men of all classes. It was a Samaritan 
(not a traditional Jew) whom the Saviour introduced into this parable as the 
genuine philanthropist and exemplar of practical compassion, — a standing warning 
to conventional religionists not to decry good things by whomsoever done, and not 
to point to their own faith, however correct, unless the works of love, resulting 
from it, attest its sincerity and its success. 

(3) Of all means that seek the prevention of evils rather than their mitigation, 
or the partial removal of their bad effects. He is the best of good Samaritans 
who drives out the robbers and averts their attack on the peaceful traveler. The 
Temperance reform, which aims at the absolute prevention of intemperance, will 
secure this greatest of all results just so soon as it is adequately supported by 
Christians and patriots of every class, who are willing to ' do good ' in this man- 
ner, as God gives them opportunity. The ' good Samaritan ' did this good at 
some risk, trouble, and expense; while the benefits imparted by the Temperance 
movement to the intemperate and their friends, are purchased by no real loss, but 
secure much personal advantage to those who use its principles for the rescue or 
preservation of their neighbors. 



Chapter XII. Verse 19. 
And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for 
many years ; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. 



Eat, drink, and be merry] Phage, pie, euphrainou. Here speaks the 
undisguised sensualist, whose ' god is his belly.' It should be remembered, more- 
over, that alcoholic liquor, when used far short of drunken excess, tends princi- 
pally to intensify the animal appetites, while it hardens the mind against the moral 
and spiritual influences directed upon it. 



Chapter XII. Verse 45. 
But and if that servant say in his heart, My lord delayeth his 
coming ; and shall begin to beat the men-servants and maidens, and 



to eat and drink, and to be drunken. 



And to eat and drink, and to be drunken] Esthiein te kai pinein kai 
methuskesthai, 'and to eat and drink, and be surcharged.' Codex D has esthibn 
te kai pinon methuskomenos, 'with eating and drinking, being drunk (or sur- 
charged).' Methuskesthai is intended to indicate that the eating and drinking 



LUKE, XXI. 34. 299 



would be in such degree as to cause repletion ; whether intoxication resulted 
would depend on the kind of drinks consumed. 



Chapter XVII. Verses 26 — 28. 

26 And as it was in the days of Noe, so shall it be also in the days 
of the Son of man. 27 They did eat, they drank, they married wives, 
they were given in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the 
ark, and the flood came, and destroyed them all. 28 Likewise also as 
it was in the days of Lot : they did eat, they drank, they bought, they 
sold, they planted, they builded. 



V. 27. They did eat, they drank] Eestkion, epinon, * they ate, they drank/ 
Both eating and drinking here carry with them an emphatic meaning, implying not 
the mere acts of eating and drinking, but excessive addiction. [See Note on Matt, 
xxiv. 38.] 



Chapter XX. Verse 9. 

Then began he to speak to the people this parable : A certain man 
planted a vineyard, and let it forth to husbandmen, and went into a 
far country for a long time. 



A vineyard] Ampelona, 'a vineyard.' [See Notes on Matt. xxi. 33, and 
Mark xii. I.] 



Chapter XXI. Verse 34. 

And take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be over- 
charged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so 
that day come upon you unawares. 



Be overcharged] Barunthosin, 'be made heavy '= dull, stupid. Codices 
Aleph, B, and C read bareethdsin, 'be weighed down ' = oppressed. 

With surfeiting, and drunkenness] En kraipalee kai methee, ' in debauch 
and drunkenness.' Robinson's Lexicon, under kraipalee, has the following: — 
" Properly, seizure of the head: hence, intoxication and its consequences, giddiness, 
headache, etc. Latin, crapula. Luke xxi. 34, en kraipalee kai methee, i. e. in 
constant revelling, carousing." 

And so that day come upon you unawares] Aiphnidios, rendered in A. V. 
* unawares,' is literally 'unforeseen.' Codex Aleph has ephnidios. Addiction to 
sensuality not only takes off the thoughts from the recompense of evil-doing, but 
so bedims and even blinds the judgment, that the day of judgment may be strictly 
said to be 'unforeseen.' 



300 LUKE, XXIII. 36. 



Chapter XXII. Verses 17, 18. 

17 And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and 
divide it among yourselves : 18 For I say unto you, I will not drink 
of the fruit of the vine, until the kingdom of God shall come. 



V. 17. The cup] Poteerion, 'a cup.' Codices A and C read to poteerion, 
'the cup.' 

Take this] Labete touto, 'take this.' In Codex Aleph, touto was omitted by 
the copyist, but is supplied by another hand. 

Among yourselves] Heautois, 'among yourselves.' Codices B and C have 
is heautous, 'for yourselves.' Codex Aleph reads alleelois, 'among one another,' 
but a second hand has written eis heautous. 

V. 18. The fruit of the vine] Tou genneematos tees ampelou, 'the offspring 
of the vine.' All the old MSS. x0.2Ageneem.atos. Codices Aleph, B, and D add 
the words apo tou nun, ' from the (time) now ' ; and Codices Aleph, B, and C, 
instead of heos hotou, 'until,' read heos ou. 



Chapter XXII. Verse 20. 



Likewise also the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the new 
testament in my blood, which is shed for you. 



The cup] To poteerion, 'the drinking-cup. ' This verse is absent from Codex D. 
[See Notes on Matt. xxvi. 27 — 29.] 



Chapter XXIII. Verse 36. 

And the soldiers also mocked him, coming to him, and offering him 
vinegar. 



Vinegar] Oxos, 'sour wine,' vinos being understood. [See Note on Matt, 
xxvii. 48.] 



THE 

GOSPEL ACCORDING TO JOHN. 



Chapter II. Verses i — n. 

i And the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee ; and 
the mother of Jesus was there : 2 And both Jesus was called, and his 
disciples, to the marriage. 3 And when they wanted wine, the mother 
of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine. 4 Jesus saith unto her, 
Woman, what have I to do with thee ? mine hour is not yet come, 
s His mother saith unto the servants, Whatsoever he saith unto you, 
do it. 6 And there were set there six waterpots of -stone, after the 
manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three firkins 
apiece. 7 Jesus saith unto them, Fill the waterpots with water. And 
they filled them up to the brim. 8 And he saith unto them, Draw 
out now, and bear unto the governor of the feast. And they bare it. 
9 When the ruler of the feast had tasted the water that was made 
wine, and knew not whence it was : (but the servants which drew the 
water knew ;) the governor of the feast called the bridegroom, 10 And 
saith unto him, Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine ; 
and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse : but thou 
hast kept the good wine until now. » This beginning of miracles 
did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, and manifested forth his glory; and his 
disciples believed on him. 



V. 1. In Cana] En Kana. Both the situation of this village and the significa- 
tion of its name have been warmly discussed. Kefr Kenna, about an hour and a 
half s ride N.E. of Nazareth, has still some advocates, but critical consent is gene- 
rally given to Dr Robinson's arguments on behalf of Kana-el-Jelil, a village situated 
about three hours' distance, due north, from Nazareth. 

The mother of Jesus was there] It is a conjecture, not devoid of plausi- 
bility, that this was the marriage of some young relative of Mary, so that she ' was 
there ' not so much by invitation as of right, and could therefore, without obtrusive- 
ness, address the servants as recorded in ver. 5. 

V. 2. Was called] Ekleethee, ' called ' == invited. 

V. 3. And when they wanted wine] Kai hustereesantos oinou, 'and wine 
running short ' = being deficient. Wiclif, ' and whanne wyne failid. ' So all the 
old English versions. A later hand has altered Codex Aleph into oinon ouk eichon 
oti sunetelesthee, ' they had not wine because it was used up. ' The original supply 



302 JOHN, II. I — II. 



may have been too limited, or the guests were more numerous than was at first 
expected. A marriage party in the East lasted several days, and this deficiency 
probably occurred upon the last day, soon after the Lord and His disciples had 
arrived. Incidentally, this notice of a short supply of wine suggests that the 
wedded persons were not wealthy, else the purchase of a sufficient quantity would 
have been the first and simplest course to be proposed. 

They have no wine] Oinon ouk echousi, 'wine they have not.' A later 
correction in Codex Aleph gives oinos ouk estin, 'wine is not.' 

V. 4. What have I to do with thee] Ti emoi kai soi, 'what to Me and 
thee ? ' i. e. ' what is there in common to Me and thee ? ' Mary thought only of 
supplying the deficiency,* Jesus of showing forth the Father's glory. The concep- 
tions of the earthly mother and the heavenly Son moved upon different planes. 
This remarkable expression throws light upon the extent of the miracle itself. 

V. 6. Six waterpots of stone . . . containing two or three firkins 
APIECE] Hudriai lithinai hex . . . chorousai ana metreetas duo ee treis, ' six 
stone water-jars . . . holding each two or three measures.' The Greek metreetees 
is supposed to have corresponded with the Attic amphora, and to have held about 
eight gallons English. Reckoning two and a half measures to each water-jar, we 
may assign to every vessel a quantity of water equal to twenty gallons English, and 
to the whole six jars a quantity equal to 120 gallons. (Alford reckons the total at 
126 gallons.) During a visit to this region, Dr E. D. Clarke saw a number of 
large massive stone pots "lying about, disregarded by the present inhabitants as 
antiquities with whose original use they were unacquainted." They would have 
held from eighteen to twenty-seven gallons of water each. 

V. 7. Fill the water pots with water. And they filled them up to 
the brim] The amount of water in each of the jars had probably been reduced 
by the use made of it for the ablutionary purifications commonly practised; but 
the command was chiefly given in order that the guests might see that each vessel 
contained water, and water only; since the infusion of a coloring liquid would 
have stained the whole quantity in any particular jar. 

V. 8. Bear unto the governor of the feast] Pherete to architriklino t 
' carry (what is drawn) to the architriklino s. ' This was the guest who occupied 
'the uppermost seat at a feast,' and exercised a general superintendence over all 
its proceedings. 

And they bare it] Kai eenenkan, 'and they carried (it).' 

V. 9. And knew not whence it was] He did not know from whence the 
wine had been got. 

But the servants which drew the water knew] Oi de diakonoi eedeison 
oi eentleekotes to hudor, 'but the servants knew, who had drawn the water.' This 
expression is very striking, for it shows that what was drawn from out of the vessel 
was then water, and that its transmutation into wine was accomplished (not as 
Lucke, quoted by Alford, intimates, in the interval between ver. 7 and ver. 8, but) 
while the water was in transit from the water-jar to the governor. The view of 



•That this is so can hardly be doubted, though men so eminent as Bengel and Calvin have 
ascribed other motives to Mary, of a totally different kind ; such as a desire that the assembly 
should be broken up before the scarcity was perceived, or that Jesus should deliver a religious 
discourse. 



JOHN, II. I— II. 303 



Archbishop Trench, that this ' drawing ' had reference to drawing in order to fill 
the jars with water, is far-fetched. Nothing can be clearer than that it points 
back to the command of Jesus, ' Draw now ' (ver. 8), after the vessels were filled 
to the brim. 

V. 10. Every man at the beginning doth set forth good wine] 
Pas anthropos proton ton kalon oinon titheesi, 'every man (2. e. who is a numphios, 
'bridegroom,' as thou art) places first the good wine ' — that which is specially good, 
held in most esteem. 

And when men have well drunk] Kai hotan methusthosi, ' and when they 
(the guests) have drunk to the full ' ; Wiclif, ' whanne men ben fulfillid ' ; Tyndale, 
1 when men be dronke ' ; so Cranmer. The Geneva V., ' wel droncke ' ; the Rheims, 
'wel drunke.' The A. V. is opposed to the assumption that methud and methusko 
necessarily signify drinking in the sense of intoxication. The governor did not 
refer to the inebriating effect, but to the large quantity consumed, and this is the 
primary signification of the word. 

Then that which is worse] Tote tov elasso, 'then (he places) the inferior.' 
The governor has been supposed to refer here to the loss of sensibility — to the 
impaired delicacy of the palate — induced by drinking intoxicating wines, thus 
enabling hosts to pass off their coarser wines at the fag-end of their entertainments ; 
but this supposition — redolent of the public-house, and not at all complimentary to 
the effect of intoxicating liquor upon the nerves of taste — is not required to account 
for the governor's allusion. The best viands (food as well as liquors) would 
naturally be produced first, because of a desire to make a good impression at the 
outset, because guests would then be most critical, and because, where a succession 
of visitors had been invited, the most important would be the first to arrive. Even 
where the same persons continued present, when enough of the best viands had 
been consumed, there would be no inclination for the inferior. As to what was 
esteemed 'the good wine,' there is ample evidence that the stronger (unmixed) 
wines were not preferred or drunk except by vicious or intemperate men, and that 
the sweetest and lightest wines, almost, if not altogether, incapable of intoxicating, 
were deemed the best by all sober persons. Indeed, the governor's language im- 
plies that ' the good wine ' usually provided at feasts was of a kind that could be 
abundantly used without inebriation ; and in one remarkable passage, Philo (who 
flourished during and after our Lord's life upon earth) describes the votaries of 
wine proceeding from one kind to another, till they finished up with great draughts 
of the unmixed and strongest sorts.* 

But thou hast kept the good wine until now] Su teteereekas ton kalon 
oinon heds arti, 'thou hast kept back the good wine until now.' This wine of 
which he had tasted from the cup presented by the servants was so superior in all 
the finer qualities of wine (such as sweetness, mellowness, and fragrance), that it 
seemed to the governor as if the usual order of things had been reversed, and that 
the best wine had been reserved till the last. This opinion was expressed by the 
president when he had merely ' tasted ' the wine, and could not have been founded, 
therefore, upon any evidence of its alcoholic strength — its power to inflame the 
body or disorder the brain. 



*On Drunkenness, sect. 53. 



304 JOHN, II. I — II. 



I. The nature of the miracle is unfolded in the statement that the * water 
became wine ' — had acquired all the sensible properties of wine, and, according to 
the governor's decision, wine of the best kind. The process of the miracle is not 
explained, for it is not explicable. In the natural world, all that science can 
observe (and this very imperfectly) is the connection and succession of phenomena; 
the cause of that connection and succession is among the deep things of God. In 
the supernatural, the ultimate cause is not more mysterious than in the natural, but 
the succession of phenomena, if there be succession, is too rapid to admit of dis- 
crimination. In this beginning of the Lord's miracles we have (i) His two com- 
mands to the servants, 'Fill up the jars,' 'Draw (from one jar) and bear to the 
governor ' of the feast; (2) their obedience — they fill up, they draw, and carry the 
water to the governor ; (3) the exertion of a Divine energy, and the instantaneous 
metamorphosis of the water into wine. That the water became alcoholic wine is 
an assumption which opponents of the Temperance movement have first made, and 
have then put forward as an objection! 'It was wine, they say, 'and that is 
enough. /or us.' But if it is enough that wine was created, their objection evapo- 
rates at once ; for unless they can show that fermentation is essential to the nature 
of wine, they have no right to assume that, besides making the water wine, the 
Lord also made it wine such as they are enamored with. That it was ' good 
wine,' the very best that could be provided, is also true, but the taste of English 
wine-drinkers is no standard of the taste of a Jewish architriklinos, Anno Domini 30. 

The burden of proof -here rests with the advocate of alcoholic wine ; and it is 
impossible that the slightest shadow of proof can be advanced in behalf of their 
hypothesis. Those who uphold it, generally consider that the whole of the water 
was transformed into wine, but is it credible that 120 gallons of intoxicating liquor 
should have been provided by Christ for one wedding party, and at the end of the 
drinking ? What Christian would do so now ? The statement of the governor as 
to persons having ' well drunk ' was a general reference, and had no special appli- 
cation to that particular company ; yet it is highly probable that the guests then 
assembled had already freely partaken of such wine as had been provided. The 
case for alcoholic wine, therefore, requires it to be assumed that, in addition to a 
considerable quantity of such wine before consumed, the Lord miraculously pro- 
duced a much larger quantity for the use of the men and women collected together ! 
But (1) this assumption is wholly without proof; and (2) it involves a reflection 
upon the wisdom of the Son of God, which ought to insure its rejection by every 
reverential mind. Restricting attention, however, for the present to the contents 
of the cup placed before the governor of the feast, there are many strong reasons 
for rejecting the opinion that it contained fermented wine. 

1. The process of fermentation is one of decay, and it is not probable that it 
would have been imitated, or its results realized, by the fiat of the Saviour. In 
all fermentative action, vital growth is arrested, organized matter is disintegrated, 
and a retrogression ensues. It is a passage from more complex to more elementary 
form — in fact, from diet to dirt. To produce pure grape-juice, the unfermented 
fruit of the vine, would, if possible to man, be a closer imitation of the creative 
plan of Providence than calling a derivative substance into existence. It is by the 
growth of food that God blesses the world; and though decay is tributary to 
future growth, it is in and by the growth that we discern the goodness, and glory, 
and purpose of His power. The end and adaptation of food is to condense power — 
the power with which we live, and see, and think — by which we realize the Divine 
works and glory. The whole meaning of our Lord's metaphor, ' I am the vine, 
and ye are the branches,' rests on this physiological fact. If the water of life 



JOHN, II. I — II. 305 



was first made into that precious juice the blood of the vine, and then transformed 
into alcohol, the Son did exactly the contrary of that which the Father doeth in each 
season, when He ' bringeth forth food out of the earth, wine that maketh glad the 
heart of man. ' But if Jesus did on this occasion that which was creatively highest 
and best, he did not produce a fermented and intoxicating drink. 

2. It is against the principle of scriptural and moral analogy to suppose that the 
Saviour exerted His supernatural energy to bring into being a kind of wine which 
had been condemned by Solomon and the prophets as ' a mocker ' and ' defrauder,' 
and which the Holy Spirit had selected as an emblem of the wrath of the 
Almighty. 

3. A most beautiful and satisfactory hypothesis has been conceived which obviates 
all resort to the theory of a direct creation of alcoholic wine. It is that in the cup 
the Lord repeated, but with supernatural rapidity, that marvellous conversion of 
water into ' the pure blood of the grape ' which takes place annually within the 
berries of the growing vine. St Augustine was one of the first, if not the first, 
of the Christian fathers who propounded this hypothesis, saying (in his Tractus 8, 
Evang. Joannis), Ipse enim fecit vinum illo die in nuptiis in sex Mis hydriis quas 
impleri aqud precepit qui omni anno facit hoc in vitibus. Sicut enim qaod miserunt 
ministri in hydrias in vinum conversum est opere Domini, sic et quod nubes fundunt 
in vinum convertitur ejusdem opere Domini. Illud autem non miramur quia omni 
anno fit ; assiduitate amisit admiraiionem : " For He on that marriage day made 
v/ine in the six jars which He ordered to be filled with water — He who now makes 
it every year in the vines. For as what the servants had poured into the water-jars 
was turned into wine by the power of the Lord, so also that which the clouds pour 
forth is turned into wine by the power of the selfsame Lord. But we cease to 
wonder at what is done every year; its very frequency makes astonishment to 
fail." So Chrysostom (Homily 22 on John), Nun mentoi deikmis hoti autos estin 
ho in tais ampelois to hudor metaballon kai ton hueton dia tees rhizees eis oinon 
trepon, hope* en to phtito dia pollou chronou ginetai touto athroon en to gamo 
eirgasato: "Now indeed making plain that it is He who changes into wine the 
water in the vines and the rain drawn up by the roots, He produced instantly at 
the wedding feast that which is formed in the plant during a long course of time." 
In sympathy with these expositions, Dr Trench, now Archbishop of Dublin, in 
his 'Lectures on the Miracles,' remarks (p. 105), "He who each year prepares 
the wine in the grape, causing it to drink up and swell with the moisture of earth 
and heaven, to transmute this into its own nobler juices, concentrated all those 
slower processes now into the act of a single moment, and accomplished in an 
instant what ordinarily He does not accomplish but in months. This analogy 
does not, indeed, help us to understand what the Lord at this time did, but yet 
brings before us that in this He was working in the line of (above, indeed, but 
not across, or counter to) His more ordinary workings, which we see daily around 
us, the unnoticed miracles of every-day nature." It does not militate against the 
fitness and beauty of this exposition that Augustine and Archbishop Trench are 
afterward inconsistent with themselves, by falsely ascribing to the wine of miracle 
the properties which are solely generated in the fermenting vat. 

The venerable Joseph Hall, D.D., Bishop of Norwich (1600), in his 'Contem- 
plations ' on this miracle, evidently adopts St Augustine's explanation. His 
words are as follow: — "What doeth He in the ordinary way of nature, but turn 
the watery juice that arises up from the root into wine ? He will only do this now 
suddenly, and at once, which He doth usually by sensible degrees." The pious 
and celebrated Rev. W. Law, M. A., in his reply to Dr Trap (1742), does not 

39 



r 



306 



JOHN, II. I — II. 



notice St Augustine, but gives the same explanation in almost the same words ; 
only he suggests that the wine formed by the direct operation of the Divine power 
was "wine very much freed from all that evil, wrath, and curse which is inseparable 
from the ordinary workings of the present state of nature." ** Simply to state this 
theory of St Augustine is to secure the adhesion to it of almost every unbiased 
mind ; yet, if accepted, it disposes entirely of the other theory, which represents 
the production of an alcoholic wine as necessary to the completeness and grandeur 
of the miracle. As soon as the grape is formed, it is found to contain a watery 
fluid, which, in the course of months, under the influence of Divine forces, is 
transmuted into a luscious juice, food for the healthy and medicine to the sick; 
and such wine it was which, with miraculous majesty, the Lord produced from the 
liquid that had been drawn the instant before from the water-jar, 'filled to the 
brim.' 



* We regret to see that in the Fifth Edition of his ' Greek Testament,' Dr Alford retains the 
note that appeared in earlier editions, which, it might have been hoped, reflection would have 
induced him to expunge. It is as follows, italics and all : — " The large quantity thus created has 
been cavilled at by unbelievers. We may leave them to their cavils, with just one remark, — that 
He who creates abundance enough in this earth to 'put temptation in men's way,' acted on this 
occasion analogously with His known method of dealing. We may answer an error on the other 
side (if it be on the otlier side) by saying that the Lord here most effectually, and once for all, 
stamps with His condemnation that false system of moral reformation which would commence by 
pledges to abstain from intoxicati?ig liquors. He pours out His bounty for all, and He vouch- 
safes His grace to each for guidance ; and to endeavor to evade the work which He has appointed 
for each man, by refusing the bounty to save tlie trouble of seeking the grace, is an attempt which 
must ever end in degradation of the individual motives, and in social demoralization, whatever 
present apparent effects may follow its first promulgation. One visible sign of this degradation, 
rn its intellectual form, is the miserable attempt, made by some of the advocates of this movement, 
to show that the wine here, and in other places of Scripture, is unfermented wine, not possessing 
the power of intoxication." On this we observe, — 

i. That Strauss, and other unbelievers, agree with the Dean in believing the evangelist to 
describe the manufacture of 126 gallons of intoxicating liquor for a company of guests at a village 
wedding feast; and on this common assumption Strauss founds an objection against the moral 
character of Jesus. The Dean's reply is exceedingly weak, for it is true that such a supply of an 
intoxicating drink would have presented a temptation to drunken excess, and it is not true that 
such a provision would have been analogous to all or to any things in the Divine procedure, for 
' God is not tempted of evil, neither tempteth He any man.' 

*. The sneer as to the ' error on the other side (if it be on the other side)" 1 is unworthy either 
of the Dean's acumen or candor. To maintain that the wine provided by the Lord was free from 
that element which makes intoxicating liquor essentially dangerous, is certainly 'on the other 
side,' so far as relates to any possible implication, or shadow of reproach, upon the character of the 
blessed Saviour. 

3. That the Lord by this miracle has stamped His condemnation on the disuse of intoxicating 
liquors, or pledges to that end, is not at all evident by the stamping phraseology of the Dean : for 
he roughly and rudely claims as proved the very point at issue — that the wine produced was intoxi- 
cating ; and he is guilty of a transparent petitio principii in representing alcoholic liquors, which 
can spring from the destruction only of good food, as being in themselves the gift of the Divine 
bounty as directly as the corn of the field and the fruit of the tree ! He further assumes (in oppo- 
sition to all fact and experience) that there is no difference between intoxicating and unintoxicating 
substances in their tendency to seduce and deprave mankind ! 

4. That abstainers refuse the bounty in order to save themselves the trouble of seeking for the 
protecting grace, is at once impertinent and slanderous, though a Dean has written the words. 
Intoxicating liquors are abstained from because they have no claim to be regarded as a true food ; 
and as offering, by their very action on the frame, a temptation to excess, which it is the distinct office 
of Christian wisdom to avoid. The grace of God is surely as much displayed in leading men away 
from needless temptation as in protecting them in it. [See Note on Matt. iv. 7.] 

5. The Dean's prophetic forecast of the demoralization to be produced by the Temperance 
movement has now been many years in print, but remains as far from fulfillment as at first. The 
facts are against him. Would it not do him more honor to confess his error, or at least withdraw 
the prophesy from observation, until he can give proof of his inspired mission ? 

6. The advocates, whose ' miserable attempt ' excites the Dean's contempt, can afford to smile at 
his miserable travesty of their object, which is not, as he appears to conceive, to prove all the 
wines of Scripture to have been unfermented, but to ascertain, by examination and induction, 
what the testimony of Scripture really is concerning the things to which the name 'wine' is 
attached in the English version. As to the miracle at Cana, Augustine, Chrysostom, Bishop Hall, 
Mr Law, and Archbishop Trench, must also be charged with the ' miserable attempt ' of which these 
Temperance advocates are accused : and in such company they can complacently listen to all that 
the Dean's ignorance and arrogance may allege against them. 

7. The gross inconsistency of the Dean himself will be seen by the extract from his ' Notes • on 
Rev. viii. 1. The only difference between him and those whom he stoutly abuses is, that they 
recognise the identity of alcohol in wine with alcohol in ardent spirits, and the Dean does not. 



JOHN, II. I — II. 307 



II. The extent of the miracle next invites our attention. So common is the 
impression that all the water in all the stone jars was converted into wine, that it 
is startling to have this traditionary interpretation called in question. It is certain, 
however, that this common belief is a deduction from the narrative, and is not 
asserted in any part of it ; nor is too much reliance to be placed on this general 
consensus of opinion, since the equally general, but probably unjust, identification 
of Mary Magdalene with the woman who was a sinner, shows how broad a stream 
of popular persuasion may flow from trifling sources. The impression that all the 
water was converted into wine was derived, — 

(1) From the fact of Mary's anxiety for a fresh supply of wine, connected with 
a notion that Jesus would meet her wishes; and (2) from imagining that the 
approval of the governor would be followed by a resort to the stone jars for more 
of the prized and superior beverage. But it must be remembered (1) that the 
notable words of Jesus addressed to Mary, ' What have I to do with thee ? (rather, 
What is there between Me and thee?) My hour is not yet come,' seem to point to 
a difference, and not a similarity, of purpose between Jesus and His mother — she 
intent on a large supply of wine, and He on some object not yet revealed. (2) 
That as the servants knew that the change had occurred after the water was drawn, 
their statement would not induce the company to expect that wine could be drawn 
from the stone jars, but would directly fix universal attention upon Him by whom 
the command to draw and carry to the governor was first issued. 

It is- quite clear that even to supply the wants of the company the conversion of 
120 gallons of water into wine was not necessary, and the complete silence of the 
apostle who was present as to any such general change, or any further transmuta- 
tion than that of the water in the cup, is exceedingly peculiar, and, in fact, unac- 
countable, if any more extensive metamorphosis was effected. By contrasting this 
silence with the full accounts given of the multiplication of loaves and fishes, the 
argument against the traditional opinion becomes greatly strengthened. None but 
a very undisciplined judgment will consider the miracle to have been less extraor- 
dinary if confined to a cup of water instead of comprehending the contents of six 
water-jars. A miracle is not to be measured by the extent of cubic inches affected 
by it. Nothing short of a Divine power could have changed the water in one cup 
into wine, and reason asserts that this power could, if Divine reason had seen fit, 
have changed into wine not only all the water in the six jars, but in all the wells of 
Cana, and of Galilee of the Gentiles. 

III. The primary object of this miracle was to make an incontrovertible 
manifestation of the ' Spirit of Power ' inherent in Jesus of Nazareth, and so to 
induce personal confidence in Him as the Sent of God. This object was accom- 
plished: ephanerosen teen doxan autou. 'He revealed His glory,' and therefore 
episteusan eis auton oi matheetai autou, ' His disciples put faith in Him. ' Beginning 
by proving the subjection of matter to His and His Father's will, the Son of God 
afterward went forth to make proof of His sovereignty over evil disease and evil 
spirits, and to reduce to voluntary obedience the sons of men, that He might raise 
them, by spiritual adoption, to the dignity of 'sons of God.'* Some of the 
Fathers, who were engaged in controversy with the Manichaeans, and with others 
who asserted the sinfulness of matter and the intrinsic virtue of self-inflicted 



"» For a full development of the hidden adaptations of this miracle to the heresy of Dualism, see 
4 Works of Dr Lees,' vol. iii. The reservation of the record of the first miracle to the latest of the 
Gospels supports the conception that it was designed to refute the Manichean conceptions which 
clouded the light of the early Church. 



308 John, iv. 5—7. 



austerities, considered that this miracle was performed in order to set the seal of 
the Redeemer's disapproval upon such heretical doctrine and practices. That His 
presence at a marriage feast wa's intended to show His approval of the connubial 
relation, and the hospitable amenities of social life, may be freely granted, but all 
other considerations were clearly subservient to the epiphany of His glory, and the 
prosecution of His Messianic mission. As Mr Law forcibly remarks, " Herein 
lay the strength, and certainty, and glory of the miracle, that so many witnesses 
were forced to see and own that by the word of our Lord wine was drawn from 
pots just filled, and still remaining full to the top, with water. And when this 
miracle had incontestably manifested itself, the whole affair was over, and the 
guests were left, not to rejoice over full pots of water turned into wine, but to make 
sober reflections upon the Divinity of that Person who had put such an astonishing 
end to their drinking. Great and holy Jesus ! how like Thyself, the Saviour ot 
the world, hast Thou acted at this feast ! How couldst Thou more sink the value, 
extinguish the desire, suppress all thoughts of pleasure and indulgence in earthly 
wine, than by showing the feasters that from the poorest of the elements Thou 
couldst call forth such wine as no grape could give ? How couldst Thou more 
effectually take from them their sensual joy, or more powerfully call them to deny 
themselves and come after Thee, than by thus miraculously showing them that the 
richest delights of sensual gratification were far short of what Thou couldst give to 
them that would leave all earthly delights for Thee ? " It would not be difficult to 
discover in the cup of supernatural new wine, a mystical emblem of the superiority 
of Christian blessings over those of other dispensations ; but it is better to be 
satisfied with the evangelist's declaration, ' He showeth forth His glory.' * 



Chapter IV. Verses 5 — 7. 

5 Then cometh he to a city of Samaria, which is called Sychar, 
near to the parcel of ground that Jacob gave to his son Joseph. 

6 Now Jacob's well was there. Jesus therefore, being wearied with 
his journey, sat thus on the well : and it was about the sixth hour. 

7 There cometh a woman of Samaria to draw water : Jesus saith 
unto her, Give me to drink. 



V. 5. Sychar] Suchar. This city occupied the site of the ancient Shechem 
or Sychem, a city of Ephraim, beautifully placed between Mount Ebal and Mount 
Gerizim. It survives in the modern Nablous, a native corruption of the Greek 
word Neapolis, ' New City. ' The name Sychar is supposed to have been given 
to it in contempt by the Jews, either from shahqer, ' falsehood, ' as being the seat 



♦Richard Crashaw's celebrated, though rather fanciful epigram, will be read with interest by 
all who accept this wondrous sign ; — 

Unde rubor vestris et non sua purpura lympkis ? 
Qucz rosa mirantes tarn nova mutat aquas ? 
Numen, conviva ! pr&sens, cognoscite numen, 
Nympha pudica Dettm vidit, et erubuit. 

Whence the strange purple this pale water shows ? 
What rose so fresh has touched it till it glows? 
A Power Divine, ye guests, discern ! — be hushed, — 
The modest maid has seen her God and blushed. 



JOHN, VI. 12. 309 



of the false worship of the Samaritans; or from shikkor, 'drunkard,' in allusion to 
Isa. xxviii. 17, where the drunkenness of the then inhabitants is vividly portrayed. 

V. 6. Now Jacob's well was there] Een de ekei peegee ton Iakbb, ' Now 
a spring of Jacob was there.' Peegee signifies a ' source,' ' spring,' or ' fountain ' ; 
but in ver. 11 the word for 'well' — 'the well is deep' — is phrear, 'a pit.' The 
phrear was dug round the peegee, and usually lined with masonry, for the better 
preservation of the water. Jacob's well still remains ; and though in Maundrell's 
time it had five feet of water, it is now dry, — most likely because the ancient spring 
has been choked up by accumulations of rubbish. The well's diameter is about 
three yards, its depth thirty-five. 

V. 7. Give me to drink] The Lord was weary and thirsty, and He did not, 
like many of those who bear His name, despise the best beverage for man. 



Chapter IV. Verse 10. 
Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, 
and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest 
have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water. 



Living water] Chrysostom's comment upon this phrase is felicitous: — "The 
grace of the Holy Spirit. For as the water which descends from heaven nourishes 
and vivifies, and though it be of one kind, operates in various ways, — is snow- 
white in the lily, but dark-colored in the narcissus, blushes in the rose, is purple 
in the violet, is sweet in the fig, but bitter in the wormwood ; so also the Divine 
Spirit, which descends from heaven, nourishes and vivifies the soul, and though of 
one kind, exerts its power and efficacy in various ways." 



Chapter IV. Verse ii. 
The woman saith unto him, Sir, thou hast nothing to draw with, 
and the well is deep : from whence then hast thou that living water ? 



Nothing to draw with] Ouie antleema echeis, 'a bucket thou hast not.' 
Thevenot says that 'travelers provide themselves with small leathern buckets, 
because the wells in those parts are furnished with no apparatus for drawing. ' 



Chapter VI. Verse 12. 
When they were filled, he said unto his disciples, Gather up the 
fragments that remain, that nothing be lost. 



Having miraculously illustrated the Divine beneficence, the Lord now inculcates 
the practice of an economy no less Divine. The fragments of this bountiful feast 
were not to be wasted. There was need of them elsewhere, therefore they must 
be preserved. He would have Hrs disciples comply with the principle of His 
Father's government, under which nothing is lost. And if God is bountiful to 
mankind now, it is not that they may abuse, but utilize, His manifold gifts. In 



310 JOHN, XV. I. 



the production of strong drink, however, there is a waste of food so prodigious as 
scarcely to be credible [see Note on Gen. i. 29], and at radical variance with the 
example and exhortation of the Saviour on this occasion. He increased the supply 
of aliment, — the manufacture of strong drink decreases it; he commanded that 
'nothing be lost,' and an observance of this command would arrest at once the 
operations of every distillery, brewery, and wine factory, — never to be resumed.* 



Chapter VII. Verse 37. 

In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, 
saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. 



That great day of the feast] The eighth day of the Feast of Tabernacles. 

Let him come unto me, and drink] The 'truth and grace' which pre- 
eminently came in Jesus Christ was here offered to the people under the figure of 
water, that peerless physical blessing of a Fatherly providence. The use of the 
figure on this occasion may have been prompted by a solemnity called ' the pour- 
ing out of water,' practised by the Jews on this chief day of the feast, when they 
filled a golden vessel from the pool of Siloam, brought it into the temple with 
sound of trumpet and other ceremonies, and poured it upon the altar before the 
Lord with expressions of the liveliest joy. 



Chapter XV. Verse i. 
I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. 



Under the figure of the real or true vine {hee ampelos hee aleethinee), Jesus 
indicates the relation which He sustains to all His disciples, the 'branches,' and the 
character of the works, the 'fruit,' they are expected to bear — and certainly will 
bear, so long as they retain, in the exercise of their freedom, a vital participation in 
His grace, the sap by which all fruitfulness is promoted. Those who imagine 
that abstainers cannot enter into the beauty of this figure because they renounce 
intoxicating liquors, are ignorant of the reason of this renunciation. It is because 
they value the fruit of the vine so highly that they object to its degradation into an 
intoxicating drink. The ripe and luscious grapes are an appropriate and striking 
emblem of the good works resulting from union with Christ, just as the fermented 
juice of the grape is an appropriate and striking emblem of the moral corruption 
which, unless purged away, works only death. 

♦The principle has various applications : (1) It forbids the conversion of food into drink, whereby 
the greater part of grain is destroyed. In 1666 parts of beer, analytical chemistry shows that only 
one part is left for nourishment. (2) It condemns the expenditure of money — the representative of 
food — upon intoxicants, as a frightful waste. In the United States of America, according to the 
Secretary of the Treasury, eight millions of gallons of spirits are annually made out of grain and 
grapes — not to speak of cider, beer and wine. The annual revenue alone from this source, if fairly 
paid, would reach sixty millions of dollars. (3) But the end of food is force — bodily power — and 
every glass of intoxicating liquor drank, by exciting increased vascular action in heart, lungs, etc., 
robs the voluntary muscles and the brain of an equivalent amount of power designed for the further- 
ance of the physical, industrial, and mental work of the world. This is the real and most valuable 
capital of progress, which is for ever lost, and far transcends the mere pecuniary waste. 



JOHN, XIX. 28 — 30. 311 

Chapter XIX. Verses 28 — 30. 

28 After this, Jesus knowing that all things were now accomplished, 
that the scripture might be fulfilled, saith, I thirst. 29 Now there was 
set a vessel full of vinegar : and they filled a sponge with vinegar, and 
put it upon hyssop, and put it to his mouth. 30 When Jesus there- 
fore had received the vinegar, he said, It is finished : and he bowed 
his head, and gave up the ghost. 



V. 28. Might be fulfilled] Codex Aleph reads pkerothee, ' might be fulfilled,' 
instead of teleiothee, 'might be completed.' 

V. 29. NOW THERE WAS SET A VESSEL FULL OF VINEGAR : AND THEY FILLED 
A SPONGE WITH VINEGAR, AND PUT IT UPON HYSSOP] SkeUOS OUn ekeito OXOUS 

meston, oi de pleesantes spongon oxous kai hussopo perithentes, ' a vessel then was 
set down full of vinegar : now they filling a sponge with vinegar and placing it round 
hyssop.' Codex Aleph reads, skeuos de ekeito oxous meston : spongon oun meston 
oxous kai hussopo perithentes, ' now a vessel full of vinegar was set : and having 
placed round about hyssop a sponge then filled with vinegar.' Codices A and B 
adopt the same reading, except that they omit the kai, 'and,' before hussopo, 
'hyssop.' 

I For Exposition see Note on Matt, xxvii. 48. ] 



THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES. 



Chapter II. Verses 13 — 15. 

13 Others mocking said, These men are full of new wine. 14 But 
Peter, standing up with the eleven, lifted up his voice, and said unto 
them, Ye men of Judaea, and all ye that dwell at Jerusalem, be this 
known unto you, and hearken to my words: 15 For these are not 
drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day. 



V. 13. Others mocking said, These men are full of new wine] Heteroi 
de dia chleuazontes elegon, hoti gleukous memestomenoi eisi, ' but others jeering right 
out, said that they (the disciples) were filled with gleukos (sweet- wine).' * Wiclif s 
translation is, 'other scorned and seiden, For these men ben ful oi must. 7 Codices 
Aleph, A, B, and C, read diachleuazontes, but Bloomfield prefers the reading of 
some MSS. which omit the dia. Codex D. has diechleuazon legontes, 'jeered right 
out, saying'; also, houtoi, 'these (men),' before memestomenoi. 

V. 15. For these are not drunken, as ye suppose] Ou gar hos humeis 
hupolatnbanete methuousin, ' for these are not surcharged (with gleukos) as you 
suppose.' Codex C reads, ou . methuosin, 'should not be surcharged' 

(or drunken). 

Seeing it is but the third hour of the day] Esti gar hora tritee tees 
heemeras, ' for it is the third hour of the day ' (nine o'clock a.m.). Codex D reads, 
ousees horas tritees tees heemeras ge, ' it being the third hour of the day.' 



Two questions spring from this narrative : — How is the slander of those who 
mocked to be understood? How is St Peter's rejoinder to be construed? 

I. The slander undoubtedly insinuated is the intoxication of those who 'spoke 
with tongues ' ; nor is it necessary to consider whether the jeerers believed their 
own insinuation. Possibly they did, for Philo, who lived at this time, says, in a 
striking passage, that the most sober persons, ' abstainers,' when under the influence 
of a holy inspiration, seem to others to be in a drunken state, and do indeed 
exhibit some of the external appearances of vinous inebriation. (On Drunk, s. 36.) 
It is the form of the slander that occasions the difficulty, — 'These men are full of 
new wine.'' It has been objected to the A. V. translation of gleukos that no new 

* The following extract from Mr Macgregor's ' Thousand Miles in the Rob Roy Canoe ' will 
sufficiently indicate the popular meaning of the phrase 'new-wine,' and establish the nature and 
reality of the thing called 'sweet-wine' : — "At one of the great inns on the road, some new-wine 
was produced on the table. It had been made only the day before, and its color was exactly like 
that of cold tea, with milk and sugar in it, while its taste was very luscious and sweet. This 
'new-wine' is sometimes in request, but especially among the women (Zech. ix. 17)." — P. 215, 
Second Edit., 1866. 



THE ACTS, II. 13 — 15. 313 

wine could have been obtained at Pentecost, a month or two before the early 
vintage; and there is force in the objection, since, though grapes could be kept 
from vintage to vintage for any special purpose, it is not likely that they were 
extensively used for the production of new wine. Gleukos literally means ' sweet ' 
{oinos, 'wine,' being understood), and 'sweet wine'— the juice of the grape pre- 
served in all its original sweetness — could be obtained at any season of the year. 
That gleukos was a term specially descriptive of the juice of the grape in an unfer- 
mented state, and answered in Greek to the Latin mustum, is certain [see Prel. 
Dissert.]. 

( 1 ) It is clear that gleukos (from glukus, ' sweet ' ) primarily denoted sweet juice that 
had not undergone any change such as fermentation, whereby the saccharine matter 
is converted into alcohol and carbonic acid gas. Suidas, the etymologist, actually 
defines it as to apostalagma tees staphulees prinpaleethee, ' the droppings of the grapes 
before they are trodden.' As applied to grape-juice newly expressed, it corre- 
sponded to the Hebrew ahsis, and in a Hebrew translation of the Greek New 
Testament it is here rendered by that term. Further, gleukos was applied to wine 
whose sweetness was conserved by straining the juice, bottling it, and keeping it at 
a low temperature or by boiling it to a jellied consistence and luscious essence. 

(2) If, then, as is assumed, gleukos is here applied to wine which, though sweet, 
was also fermented, we have an example of what is denied by some careless writers, 
— that the same term can be applied to an intoxicating article as well as to a natural 
and non-intoxicating substance ; and if a specific term like gleukos could be used 
thus comprehensively, how confidently may the same be predicated of a generic 
term like oinos / 

How then, it may be asked, could the mockers, wishing to charge the disciples 
with drunkenness, accuse them of being filled with gleukos ? Why did they not 
use the generic name oinos, which comprehended wine of all sorts, fermented and 
otherwise ? 

As to the difficulty proposed, two modes of solution have been suggested. 

The first considers that gleukos here retains its primary sense of sweet, unfer- 
mented wine, and that the use of the word in that sense formed part of the mockery 
connected with the charge. Ironical insinuations are always the most cutting 
accusations, or at least are intended to be so, and constitute a mode of derision 
often used by the most refined as well as by the coarsest minds. When, therefore, 
certain men wished to exhibit their bitter animosity on the day of Pentecost, they 
did so by the jeering exclamation, ' These men are full of gleukos — sweet wine ! ' — 
meaning, on the contrary, that they were full, not of gleukos (unfermented wine), 
but of some more potent drink.* To have said, 'They are drunk,' would have 
been too blunt and direct a charge to suit the mockers; but to launch it in the 
ironical shape of taking too much innocuous juice of the grape, gratified alike their 
malignity and self-conceit. Thus a really wise man may be mocked by being 
saluted as 'Solomon,' a 'Solon,' a 'second Daniel come to judgment ' ; and the 
word ' saint ' has often been derisively applied to men of whom ' the world was 
not worthy.' 

The second explanation does not extend the mockery to the phraseology, but 
confines it to the charge of intoxication ; and it accounts for the taunt — ' full of 
sweet wine ' — by the tendency of gleukos, when carelessly allowed to ferment, 
rapidly to acquire an inebriating quality. Enough saccharine matter would remain 

* A French writer, for example, accused Proudhomme of being un buveur d'eau, ' a water-drinker/ 
really meaning the opposite — namely, ' brandy-tippler.' 

40 



314 THE ACTS, II. 13 — 15. 

undecomposed to permit an alcoholic gleukos to preserve its characteristic sweet- 
ness ; and as this sweetness would tempt to copious consumption, the results may 
be forecast.* Gleukos would thus answer to the Hebrew shakar, literally, ' sweet 
drink,' but frequently applied to liquor which would intoxicate if freely consumed. 
Hence, too, the force of the expression, memestomenoi gleukous, 'filled full of gleukos', 
implying, first, that, being luscious, a plentiful use of it was probable ; and that, 
being partially fermented, a copious potation would be needed to insure the inebri- 
ation of the drinkers. 

2. The reply of Peter is a denial of the implicit charge of drunkenness, but the 
form of his reply — ' These are not drunken, as ye suppose, seeing it is but the third 
hour of the day ' — has been adduced as an admission that the apostles were in the 
habit of using some kind of intoxicating liquor. He did not say, ' We never take 
strong drink; we are abstainers, or Nazarites,' but he fell back, as a sufficient 
refutation, upon the period of the day when the false accusation was made. The 
objection will not stand, for, — 

(i) The apostle used the only argument adapted to the character of the mockers. 
Had he said, 'We never drink at all,' the jeering rejoinder might have been, 
* Except upon the sly ! Men who get drunk are very apt to profess the strictest 
sobriety.' To have appealed to personal character or habit would have been 
useless, since both were already called in question ; but the apostle meets them on 
social grounds ; he retorts by an argumentum ad usu?n, the force of which they 
could not resist. He replies in effect, " On your own assumption that we drink to 
excess of gleukos, or something stronger, your inference is unreasonable. It is now 
but the hour of nine in the morning, and you know that ' they that are drunken are 
drunken in the night ' ; drunkards begin their debauches at night, and in the 
morning are fit for nothing; or if they should ever assemble to drink so early, they 
do not break off at this time of day, but continue till wine inflames them." Such 
a reply was just what the circumstances required, and more than the insincere 
mockery deserved. 

(2) The inference that Peter tacitly admitted that he and his colleagues used 
intoxicating drink, but not to an intoxicating excess, is wholly assumptive and 
illogical, {a ) He no more denied that himself and friends drank to excess, than that 
they drank at all ; he simply showed that if they did, they would not be likely to 
have done so at that early hour. Did he, then, tacitly acknowledge that the 
disciples were accustomed to evening debauches ? (<$) The use of the word gleukos 
by the mockers prevented an absolute denial of all use of wine, except by the 
Nazarites ; for the most rigid abstainer from intoxicating wine might freely have 
used innocent, uninebriating gleukos. (c) The conception that Peter and the early 
disciples used intoxicating liquor as a beverage, is in opposition to the ancient 
tradition which assigns to Peter and the Lord's brethren a strong sympathy with 
the regimen of the Nazarites and Rechabites. Eusebius quotes Hegesippus as 
testifying that St James, the Lord's brother, and author of the General Epistle, 'did 
not drink wine or sicera ' {pinon kai sikera ouk epien). Traces of this influence are 
very perceptible in Peter's First Epistle, i. 13; iv. 3, 7; v. 8; and in the Second 
Epistle, i. 6. [See Notes on those texts.] 

* In the United States of America there is an every-day illustration of this. The sweet cider is 
Often kept and used by professed Temperance people, who are not aware that through time, or care- 
lessness, it runs into a slight fermentation, and becomes slightly intoxicating. 



THE ACTS, XIX. 23 — 28. 315 

Chapter XI. Verse 28. 

And there stood up one of them named Agabus, and signified by 
the spirit that there should be great dearth thoughout all the world : 
which came to pass in the days of Claudius Caesar. 



This Claudius (who succeeded Caligula) reigned as Emperor of Rome A. D. 
41 — 54. He was grossly intemperate. Suetonius says of him that he scarcely 
ever left the table till he had thoroughly crammed himself and drunk to intoxica- 
tion, and would then immediately fall asleep, lying upon his back, with his mouth 
open. 



Chapter XVII. Verse 29. 

We ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or 
silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device. 



Art' (technee) and 'device' (enthumeesis). This is an apostolic distinction 
which the modern advocates of drinking frequently strive to ignore. ' All things 
are from God's power, therefore all things are God's creatures'' ! It is a kind of 
logic that proves far too much, and will lead to very immoral conclusions. Common 
sense tells us that idols, instruments of torture, lascivious statues, immoral books, 
and alcoholic drinks, cannot exist save by derived and Divine power, but conscience 
equally tells us that as their qualities are the result of their form, and their form the 
result of ' man's art and device,' man is responsible for their existence as well as 
their use ; and it is virtual blasphemy to attempt to vindicate either their ' manufac- 
ture ' or their ' use ' by calling them God's ' creatures.' It is not less an abuse of 
language and common sense to confound 'matter' with 'form,' 'power' with 
'use,' and the products of ' natural growth ' (as sugar) or of ' creation ' (as iron or 
gold) with the products of art, resulting from the fermentation of the one, or the 
melting and moulding of the other. [See Note on chap. xix. 23 — 28.] 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 18. 

And Paul after this tarried there yet a good while, and then took 
his leave of the brethren, and sailed thence into Syria, and with him 
Priscilla and Aquila ; having shorn his head in Cenchrea : for he had 
a vow. 



A vow] Eucheen. Some regard this as a Nazarite vow ; others as a civil vow, 
not unusual among Jews and Gentiles. As to the question, who had taken this 
vow ? some commentators refer to Aquila, owing to the peculiar order of the 
words 'Priscilla and Aquila,' but Paul is generally considered to be the person 
indicated by the historian Luke. 



Chapter XIX. Verses 23 — 28. 

23 And the same time there arose no small stir about that way, 
24 For a certain man named Demetrius, a silversmith, which made 
silver shrines for Diana, brought no small gain unto the craftsmen ; 



316 ' THE ACTS, XXI. 23, 24, 26. 

25 Whom he called together with the workmen of like occupation, and 
said, Sirs, ye know that by this craft we have our wealth. 26 More- 
over ye see and hear, that not alone at Ephesus, but almost through- 
out all Asia, this Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people, 
saying that they be no gods, which are made with hands : 27 So that 
not only this our craft is in danger to be set at naught ; but also that 
the temple of the great goddess Diana should be despised, and her 
magnificence should be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world 
worshippeth. 28 And when they heard these sayings, they were full of 
wrath, and cried out, saying, Great is Diana of the Ephesians. 



Demetrius and his fellow-craftsmen, who made * silver shrines ' — i. e. small 
models of the celebrated temple of Ephesus, — were zealously stirred up against 
Paul and his Christian doctrine when the prospect of diminished gain was present 
to their minds. Demetrius admits as much (ver. 25); and though we smile at the 
devotional gloss which he bestows (ver. 27) on the worldly motive that sways his 
words and actions, we know that his cant is paralleled in our own day by the 
mawkish pretences of patriotism, and appeals to Divine bounty and Scripture texts, 
advanced by the manufacturers and retailers of intoxicating liquor. Were they 
candid, they would say with Demetrius (ver. 25), ' By this craft we have our 
wealth,' and leave it there. It may be true that as the Ephesian silversmiths 
believed in Diana, so British brewers believe in the virtues of strong drink ; but it 
is not true that they would engage in the ministry of Bacchus except for the profits 
of the occupation. 



Chapter XXI. Verses 23, 24, 26. 

23 Do therefore this that we say to thee : We have four men which 
have a vow on them ; 24 Them take, and purify thyself with them, 
and be at charges with them, that they may shave their heads : and 
all may know that those things, whereof they were informed concern- 
ing thee, are nothing ; but that thou thyself also walkest orderly, and 
keepest the law. ... 26 Then Paul took the men, and the next 
day purifying himself with them entered into the temple, to signify the 
accomplishment of the days of purification, until that an offering 
should be offered for every one of them. 



That this euchee was a Nazarite 'vow' is the opinion of most expositors. 
Wetstein has quoted passages from the Rabbins to show that it was customary for 
the wealthier Jews to assist their more indigent brethren who had taken this vow, 
by bearing the expense of the sacrifice with which the vow ended ; and those who 
did this became, for the time being, partners in the vow. That Paul should have 
acted on the suggestion of the other apostles was in harmony with his great prin- 
ciple to make himself the servant of all in order that the Gospel might have free 
course and be glorified. To his large, generous heart, how petty would have 
seemed the common objections against the practice and promise of total abstinence, 
because of their supposed ' binding ' character ! To be bound by a sense of duty is 
honorable in all, and in the service of humanity the enlisted soldier is a volunteer 
of the noblest order and the highest distinction. 



THE ACTS, XXIV. 1 6, 25. 317 

Chapter XXIV. Verse 16. 

And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void 
of offence toward God, and toward men. 



The word translated ' exercise ' is asko, ' to work up' — 'to perform with care,' — 
and hence was used to denote the bodily exercise or training of athletes, and, in a 
figurative sense, the regulation and direction of the mind. From the noun askeetees 
came our 'ascetic,' which, by ignorant writers and careless speakers, is applied 
indiscriminately as a term of reproach against persons who lead a wiser and more 
careful life than themselves. The early Christian writers applied the term in a 
pious sense, to those who gave themselves up to spiritual exercises and engagements. 
St Cyril, of Jerusalem, calls the prophetess Anna, named in Luke ii. 36, 37, 
' a most religious ascetic ' {askeetria eulabestatee). Dr Eadie, giving this reference 
in his 'Ecclesiastical Cyclopaedia,' adds, "In the primitive ages such as pretended 
to this title were men of active life, living in society, and differing from the rest of 
mankind only in their exact adherence to the rules of virtue and forbearance 
inculcated in the Gospel." A false asceticism undoubtedly sprung up early, which 
has been confounded, by shallow readers, with the still earlier practice. The 
charge of asceticism (in a bad sense), leveled against the Temperance system, is 
wholly unfounded, and simply proves the ignorance or prejudice of the accusers. 
The abstainer from intoxicating liquors does not imitate the false ascetic, who cuts 
himself off from all physical and social enjoyment ; on the contrary, by his absti- 
nence he seeks so to exercise himself, in a virtuous and rational self-control, that 
his possession of all truly good things may be enlarged, and his enjoyment of them 
intensified and prolonged.* 



Chapter XXIV. Verse 25. 

And as he reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment td 
come, Felix trembled, and answered, Go thy way for this time ; when 
I have a convenient season, I will call for thee. 



Of temperance] Enkrateias, 'self-restraint.' Wiclif has 'chastite,' which is 
followed by the Rheims version, but Tyndale and the other old versions have 
'temperaunce.' Enkrateia, from enkrateuomai, 'to have self-command,' denotes 
the government of the appetites and passions. Xenophon's definition of the enkratees 
is very happy ('Memorabilia,' iv. 8), — Enkratees de hoste meedepote proaireisthai 
to heedion anti tou beltionos, ' but he is temperate who on no occasion prefers what 
is merely pleasant to what is better.' This definition is expanded by Milton in his 
'Comus,' where the lady exclaims, — 

' That which is not good is not delicious 
To a well-governed and wise appetite.' 

* Dr J. S. Howson, in his ' Lectures on the Character of St Paul,' remarks (p. 131) : — "The forma- 
tion of a Christian character without self-discipline is impossible. No doubt the highest form of virtue 
is spontaneous habit. Yet who will dare to say that his good habits are built up ? Happy is he who 
has a comfortable assurance that his bad habits are tottering to their fall. Never was Christianity, in 
any of its phases of which we have yet had experience, really efficient without the presence of an 
ascetic element." And in a foot-note he adds, " There seems to me ground for very serious regret 
that the word ' asceticism ' has not retained with us, as it has in Germany, its old signification of 
practical Christian self-discipline. In arguing once on this subject with a clergyman (a thoughtful and 
well-educated man), I found that his opinion was largely influenced by his impression that ascetic was 
derived from acetum (vinegar)." 



318 THE ACTS, XXIV. 25. 

The temperance which rejects what may be pleasant to the appetite, but not 
good, brings with it, in due time, an aversion to what was once loved. This 
reform of the appetite beginning with its restraint, is the crown of physical temper- 
ance ; self-denial is consummated and absorbed in self-gratification. Temperance 
and asceticism have a superficial resemblance which has deceived many, but the 
difference is radical ; for while asceticism seeks the emaciation of the physical 
nature, temperance aims at its most vigorous development, which can only be 
realized by the observance of physical laws, including the rejection of all deleterious 
articles. The English word 'temperance' is derived directly from the Latin 
temperantia, the root of which, as of temp-us, temp-lum, is found in the Greek 
temo, temno, tempo, 'to cut off.' Hence temperantia (temperance), as a virtue, 
is the cutting off that which ought not to be retained, — self-restraint from, not 
in, the use of whatever is pernicious, useless, or dangerous. This etymology 
is an adequate vindication of the application of the word ' temperance ' to the 
practice of abstinence from all intoxicating liquors, as being a cutting-off of those 
articles of diet that are best put away, and as the swiftest, simplest, and only 
effectual method of cutting off the intemperance that devastates the land. Prior to 
the Temperance reform, owing to the growth of drinking, the term ' intemperance ' 
had acquired a special reference to the lavish use of intoxicating liquors; and the 
Abstinence principle (first applied to ardent spirits, and afterward extended to all 
alcoholic liquors) being the direct opposite and antagonist of this intemperance — 
as well as its sole cure and sure preventive, — was justly entitled to' the Temperance 
name. The Latin moderatio (from moderor, 'to measure,' 'qualify,' 'temper,' 
' rule ') has much the same moral signification as temperantia, for true moderation 
is such a measurement and tempering of appetite by judgment and conscience, as 
involves the non-use of what is useless or hurtful, as well as the avoidance of all 
injurious use of whatever is intrinsically good and useful. In the instance of the 
text, temperance implied a total abstinence from the evil relationship referred to. 



Felix, a man addicted to licentious indulgence, was at this time living in adultery 
with Drusilla;* he was also an unjust governor, and careless of all retribution, 
except such as might emanate from the reigning Caesar. When he invited Paul to 
preach concerning the 'faith in Christ,' that bold and sagacious minister did not 
dwell, as Felix had perhaps expected, on questions of theology, but seized the 
opportunity to bring Christian truth into direct contact with his heart. The 
apostle ' reasoned of righteousness, temperance, and judgment to come ' ; and with 
such power that the conscience of the sensual worldling was touched, and he 
trembled as he heard. We learn from this, — 

1. That preaching should be practical — and always may be so — even when deal- 
ing with doctrinal subjects. From truths granted or assumed, appeals — not 
declamatory, but pungent and searching — should be constructed, that the conscience, 
enlightened and aroused, may do its salutary work. 

2. That temperance, as a part of practical preaching, is not out of place in the 
pulpit, and does not render preaching chargeable with a neglect of the gospel of 
God's grace. So, also, as abstinence from intoxicating liquor enters into tem- 
perance in its broadest sense, its advocacy comes within the legitimate range of 
pulpit reasoning and Christian exhortation. Circumstances will indicate when 
specific practical duties may be most suitably enforced, — for we should study to 
avoid giving offence, even when the whole truth is fearlessly proclaimed. The 

* The divorced wife of King Azizus. 



THE ACTS, XXV. 10. 319 

hearer must be convinced that it is not himself, but his sins or errors that are 
assailed, else the gateway of all moral influence — candid attention — will be fast 
closed. Tact and good temper are never thrown away in conciliating those whose 
conversion is desired. 



Chapter XXV. Verse 10. 

Then said Paul, I stand at Caesar's judgment seat, where I ought 
to be judged : to the Jews have I done no wrong, as thou very well 
knowest. 



The Caesar here referred to, also styled Augustus (chap. xxvi. 21, 25), was the suc- 
cessor of Claudius, the infamous Nero, who reigned as Roman emperor a.d. 54 — 69. 
In the early part of his career he was accustomed to visit taverns in disguise, and 
then ramble about the city as a marauder. Finding this ' sport ' too dangerous, he 
abandoned it, but his revels lasted, we are told by Suetonius, from mid-day to mid- 
night. Before him Paul appeared, and describes him as 'the lion ' (2 Tim. iv. 17); 
and well did he deserve the name, both on account of his savage qualities, and 
because he was accustomed, dressed up as a wild beast, to act in a vile and 
abominable manner toward men and women tied to stakes in the arena. 



THE EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE ROMANS. 



Chapter VI. Verses 12, 13. 

12 Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should 
obey it in the lusts thereof. 13 Neither yield ye your members as in- 
struments of unrighteousness unto sin : but yield yourselves unto God, 
as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instru- 
ments of righteousness unto God. 



The apostle, without giving any countenance to the dogma that identified moral 
evil with matter, earnestly enjoined a control of the bodily members necessary to 
hinder them from becoming the ' servants of sin. ' This control, if it is to be 
effectual, demands the exclusion of whatever tends to convert those members into 
' instruments of unrighteousness ' ; but who can name such an agency at all com- 
parable to intoxicating drink? Comparatively small quantities of these liquors 
will often exert a distinctly vitiating influence, and their slightest sensible effect is 
unfavorable to the perfect control of the animal by the spiritual nature. The 
ordinary social use of alcoholics, as all experience attests, stimulates every irregular 
and depraved desire. Christian prudence cannot but approve the rejection of such 
incentives to vice ; and if any one should say that they have not proved so to him- 
self, he is bound to consider whether he may not have suffered some loss without a 
perception of it; whether he is justified in risking the many mischiefs that intoxi- 
cating liquors are capable of inflicting ; and whether he acts advisedly and kindly 
in sanctioning the use of articles by which so many persons around him are 
tempted, betrayed, and undone. 



Chapter XIII. Verses i, 3. 

1 Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is 
no power but of God : the powers that be are ordained of God. . . . 
3 For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt 
thou then not be afraid of the power ? Do that which is good, and 
thou shalt have praise of the same. 



Most explicitly is it here affirmed that Civil Government is in its essence a Divine 
institution, and entrusted by God with powers of prohibition and punishment that 



ROMANS, XIII. 10, 13. 321 

ought not to lie in abeyance where preventible evil is concerned. True, Nero was 
a monster ; yet the fact that even he was the legal head of the Roman empire did 
not weaken the apostolic argument; and in whatever degree representative 
government is superior to arbitrary rule and tyranny, the moral authority of human 
law becomes the more binding and exalted. But where any government permits 
and sanctions pursuits that deprave, impoverish, and destroy its subjects by whole- 
sale, it is neglecting its proper function, and frustrating those great ends of social 
security and progress for which government, and society itself, exist. In the 
patronage extended by the British Government to the traffic in strong drink, this 
social anomaly and contradiction is seen upon a scale of colossal magnitude ; and 
the enormous revenues (upward of twenty millions of pounds annually) raised 
from the manufacture and sale of alcoholic liquors, make it the more needful that 
this illegitimate connection should be exposed. The very least that should be done 
under such circumstances is, that legally defined districts should be enabled to 
determine whether a business so anti-social in its results should be licensed and 
tolerated. A local veto-power of this kind would permit districts to protest 
against the national policy, while it would protect them against the consequences 
of a legislation so caustically described by the poet Cowper : — 

" Pass where we may, through city or through town, 
Village, or hamlet, of this merry land, 
Though lean and beggared, every twentieth pace 
Conducts the unguarded nose to such a whiff 
Of stale debauch, as makes temperance reel." 



Chapter XIII. Verse 10. 
Love worketh no ill to his neighbor : therefore love is the fulfilling 
of the law. 



Love embodied in the Christian, will effectually prevent him ' working ill to his 
neighbor,' whether by carrying on occupations that seduce and deprave, or by 
extending his sanction to dangerous and evil customs. On the contrary, * love is 
the fulfilling of the law,' — viz. of that second department of the law which com- 
prehends all a man's relations to his fellow-creatures. As love is an ever-active, 
ever-operative principle, if it does not work evil, it works out the welfare of all 
within its own reach ; and it does this not least by removing from their path all 
that can delude and betray. To this love the Temperance cause appeals for aid 
in the war against the causes of intemperance, whether residing objectively in the 
properties of strong drink, and in its general circulation and public sale, or sub- 
jectively in the fallacies and false tastes excited by its consumption as a beverage. 
Love cannot behold without grief the ravages of intoxicating liquors ; and when 
enlightened as to the true nature of such drinks, it must prompt to efforts for their 
exclusion from the home, the place of public concourse, and the Church of Christ. 
Love will ever do, as well as desire, what is best for the cure and prevention of 
intemperance 

Chapter XIII. Verse 13. 
Let us walk honestly, as in the day ; not in rioting and drunken- 
ness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. 



Honestly] Euscheemonos, ' becomingly ' (from eu, ' 'well,' 'and scheema, 'deport- 
ment ' or ' condition ')= in a manner well-suited to moral obligation «nd Christian 
character. 

41 



322 ROMANS, XIV. 1 3. 



Not in rioting] Mee komois, 'not in revelries.' Wiclifhas 'not in superflue 
feestis.' Tyndale and Cranmer have 'not in eatynge;' the Geneva V., 'not in 
glotonie ' ; the Rheims V., 'not in banketings.' Comus, the god of revelry, is 
represented as a young man wearing a garland, and with a torch falling from his 
hand, or burning his side, as he lies in a drunken sleep. The komos was either a 
festival in his honor, or a private feast, when the revellers were accustomed to 
sally out after supper, attired as bacchanals, and behaving themselves as such. 

And drunkenness] Kai methais, 'and in intemperances' — all intemperate 
indulgences of the appetite, whether in food or drink, whether attended by 
intoxication or not. A great error is committed by those who regard ' drunken- 
ness,' in the scriptural sense, as synonymous with mad or helpless intoxication. 
Philosophy likewise teaches that the sin of drinking is not in the mere physical 
degree of disturbance, but in the motive — in the relation of the mind of the 
drinker to the law of God. Another apostle taught that he who breaks one law 
breaks all, so far as God is concerned; and it is a mere commonplace that the 
law of honesty is equally violated in stealing a penny as in stealing a pound. 
Drinking for pleasure, in defiance of need and fitness, is the essence of the vice of 
drunkenness* 



Chapter XIV. Verse 13. 

Let us not therefore judge one another any more : but judge this 
rather, that no man put a stumbling-block or an occasion to fall in his 
brother's way. 



A stumbling-block] Proskomma, ' a stumbling ' = a cause of stumbling. 
Codex B omits this word, and Codex C, instead of proskomma, reads proskosma. 
Wiclif has 'hirtynge.' 

Or an occasion to fall] Ee skandalon, ' or snare ' [see Note on Matt. v. 
30]. The meaning of the passage is, that Christians are not hastily to pass judg- 
ments upon one another, and are to be exceedingly careful not to do aught that 
may cause a brother to fall or be ensnared. Whether this command has any appli- 
cation to the drinking customs of our country must depend upon the reply to the 
question, whether these customs do prove a stumbling-block and snare to Christian 
brethren. If they do — and he must be strangely ignorant who should deny it, — 
any sanction of the customs must be at variance with the apostolic precept. Nor 
is it any excuse to say, f Such customs are not causes of evil to me,' for it is not for 
his own sake, but for his brother's, that the Christian is here enjoined to be dis- 
connected from stumbling-blocks and snares. The danger to others is to be as 
carefully avoided by him as if it were danger to himself. In this, as in all respects, 
he is to do to others as he would wish them to do to him, were their circumstances 
mutually reversed. If he is to be willing to 'lay down his life for the brethren,' 
the least he can do for them is not to bring them, by act of his, into temptation 
and transgression ; yet, to carry out this negative principle of Christian fraternity, 
there must be thoughtfulness and intelligence ; for evil, wrought by ignorance and 
inconsideration, is not wrought without sin to the unintentional doer. If he who 
will not ' know to do good ' is not innocent, still less is he blameless who does evil 
because he will not ' learn to do well.' ' 



* Aristotle's Ethics. "The intemperate man desires all things pleasant, and is led by his mere 
desire to choose these things." 



ROMANS, XIV. 14 — 17. 323 

Chapter XIV. Verse 14. 

I know, and am persuaded by the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing 
unclean of itself: but to him that esteemeth any thing to be unclean, 
to him // is unclean. 



The apostle is not discussing the question whether some things are unfit for food. 
He is proceeding on the supposition that this fitness exists, and then affirms that 
there is nothing koinon, 'unclean,' of itself: in other words, that ceremonial un- 
cleanness, however defined, is not identical with moral uncleanness ; consequently, 
that no moral guilt is contracted by the use of food. Yet he allows that if even 
food is regarded as unclean by any one, it becomes to him unclean in such a sense 
that he would contract guilt by using it, seeing that he would be doing what he 
believed was an unclean action. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 15. 

But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not 
charitably. Destroy not him with thy meat, for whom Christ died. 



The argument of the apostle may be thus paraphrased : — " No food (properly 
so called) is unclean, but if on account of food (broma)— that is, any particular 
kind or preparation of food (in the A. V. ' thy ' is aptly supplied) — thy brother is 
grieved — feels distressed or aggrieved by it as unclean, — now walkest thou not 
charitably, if thou puttest it in his way and temptest him to eat it. Do not with 
thy food destroy him for whom Christ died. If he transgresses his conscience, and 
so falls away through your example, you will be chargeable with his loss, though 
you never intended it." How affecting is the apostle's appeal! — "Let not your 
meat be his destruction to whom the Lord has given His body as spiritual meat 
and His blood as spiritual drink. If Christ died for him, you ought to abstain — 
in his presence at least — from the meat which to him is unclean." 



Chapter XIV. Verses 16, 17. 

16 Let not then your good be evil spoken of: 17 For the kingdom of 
God is not meat and drink ; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in 
the Holy Ghost. 

You, continues the apostle, may partake of such food with a good conscience, 
but if your act is liable to be evil spoken of {blaspheemeistho, 'blasphemed '), and is 
an act not positively required by Christian duty, leave it undone. Your personal 
benefit is small, the injury to the cause of Christ may be great. "The kingdom of 
God is not meat and drink {btosis kai posis) ; but righteousness, and peace, and joy 
in the Holy Ghost." Neither directly nor indirectly ought 'what shall we eat? ' 
to be balanced in the scale with what concerns the advancement of the Divine 
kingdom upon earth. 



324 ROMANS, XIV. 1 8 — 21. 

Chapter XIV. Verses 18—20. 

18 For he that in these things serveth Christ is acceptable to God, 
and approved of men. 19 Let us therefore follow after the things 
which make for peace, and things wherewith one may edify another. 
20 For meat destroy not the work of God. All things indeed are 
pure ; but it is evil for that man who eateth with offence. 



Instead of en toutois, 'in these things,' all the chief MSS. read en touto, 'in 
this.' He who in this manner serves Christ — by making questions of food sub- 
ordinate to spiritual things — is acceptable {euarestos) — well-pleasing to God, and 
' approved ' of men ' (dokimos tois anthropois), — approves himself to men as being 
what he professes, i. e. spiritually and not carnally minded. Let us then follow 
(didkomeri) — pursue — 'the things of peace,' the things that promote brotherly peace, 
' and the things of edification for one another ' — things by which Christians build 
one another up in the strength and completeness of the Christian life. The idea 
of a ' building ' suggests the reiterated appeal, — do not on any account destroy 
(kataluo, dissolve, or cast down) the work of God — the living workmanship of 
God's Spirit — in the person of a Christian brother. The apostle then returns to 
the thought expressed in verse 14, asserting the undeniable truth, that, though a 
thing is pure {katharori) in itself, it becomes evil {kakori) to the conscience of the 
man who regards it as such, and yet joins himself to it; so that good food is con- 
verted into a stumbling (proshomma) — a cause of sin — to him who eats it while he 
considers it unclean. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 21. 



// is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor any thing 
whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak. 



The apostle had been alluding to the case of a Christian who considered 
meat offered to idols as having become polluted ; and he had been showing that 
by inadvertently tempting him to eat such food, his fellow-Christians were eating 
uncharitably, and imperilling his salvation. He now proceeds to state the general 
principle underlying this case, and all others of the same class. It is good {kalon) 
— morally beautiful or excellent, calculated to call forth the admiration of all 
good beings — not to eat flesh (krea), nor to drink wine (oinon), nor "to do any 
thing hy means of which thy brother stumbles, or offends, or is made weak"; 
that is, by which his conscience is impaired, as would be the case if its dictates 
were disobeyed. 

No text has been more frequently and successfully quoted than this, on behalf 
of total abstinence from intoxicating liquors; yet many objections to such an 
application of it have been taken from opposite quarters. 

Opponents have objected (1) that the apostle's reference was to a particular 
'case, and not to the question of abstaining from flesh or wine, as such, under all 
circumstances. True, but the principle is broad enough to include all circum- 
stances and occasions, where the main point is involved — the stumbling and sin of 
a brother. The question is not what particular case St Paul had in his eye, but 
whether the principle he enunciates is applicable to the use of intoxicating liquors 
as a beverage. If such use by Christians be a cause of transgression, the evident 
and essential element of moral comparison is established. 



ROMANS, XIV. 21. 325 



But it is objected (2) that the apostle limits his reference to the case where a 
person offends his own conscience, and so contracts guilt by doing what he believes 
to be wrong; whereas those who are led into evil by strong drink are persons 
generally who use it without moral hesitation or constraint. This plea, if granted, 
does not cover the numerous cases (a) where abstainers are induced to take strong 
drink, contrary to their sense of right, by the example (and even persuasion) 
of others ; and {F) where many, who are doubtful whether it is right to use such 
liquors, are moved to take them in compliance with surrounding usage, sustained 
by men with a reputation for religion. Customs are almost omnipotent in their 
influence over innumerable minds, and not least over those whose sensitive systems 
are most endangered by strong drink, who, in many cases, would gladly abstain, 
if not discouraged by the opposite conduct of persons to whom they look up. But 
the plea will not hold at all in the sense of the objector, for the argument of the 
apostle is not based on the manner of the offence, but on its existence ; and his 
conclusion is not limited to the avoidance of sin in one particular way, but extends 
to its avoidance altogether. The great end is not realized save by abstinence from 
every thing that causes another to stumble, to do evil, and to become weak. 
Reduced to its elementary form, the principle is nothing short of this, — Abstain 
from what will produce or provoke sin in others. 

It is objected (3) that the apostle restricts his reference to Christian brethren, 
and does not affirm the duty of abstaining from what is a cause of sin to men in 
general. Even with this restriction, the duty of general Christian abstinence, for 
the sake of fellow-Christians who are in danger of being seduced from their 
integrity by strong drink, is clearly deducible from this passage; but who can 
doubt that the spirit of the passage, the essence of the principle, is as applicable to 
Christian behavior in respect to men in general as it is to believers in particular ? 
The special case before him necessarily restricted the apostle's application of the 
principle to Christians who had a conscience against eating food offered to idols ; 
but who that knows how he labored ' to become all things to all men, that he 
might save some,' can doubt that he would have applied the same principle to the 
preservation of all men from vice and misery, especially from such diffusive and 
ever-deepening vice and misery as spring from indulgence in alcoholic liquors ? 
Indeed, this more extensive application is made by the apostle himself in 1 Cor. 
x. 32. See Note. 

It is proper to notice an objection entertained by some Temperance advocates 
to the common use of this passage as an argument for abstinence. "St Paul," 
they say, "is confessedly pleading with the Christians of Rome, that they should 
resign what was good in itself for the sake of the conscientious, though unfounded, 
scruples of some of their own body; and to make a corresponding appeal to 
British Christians for abstinence from intoxicating liquors is to admit, what is con- 
trary to fact, that these drinks are, like those meats, good in themselves, and that 
abstinence is expedient only on account of the prejudices of abstainers, or because 
of the weakness of those who cannot use them without going to excess. Neither 
the advocacy nor practice of abstinence that rests on such a shifting basis of 
expediency can itself be firm ; while positive error is encouraged by allowing men 
to imagine that they are sacrificing a valuable article of diet when they are induced, 
often reluctantly, to abstain out of regard to the welfare of others." There is 
sufficient plausibility in this statement to make it desirable that the Pauline argu- 
ment from Christian benevolence should never be employed, except with a distinct 
intimation that it is advanced without prejudice to the solid argument for absti- 
nence, grounded on science and experience. Still, within its own limits, the 



326 ROMANS, XIV. 22, 23. 

Pauline plea seems quite legitimate, and very forcible. It is so in relation to the 
Christian objector to total abstinence, who denies the validity of other arguments 
in its favor, since it meets him on grounds from which he cannot retreat. It 
virtually says to him, "Well, if you decline to examine the evidence of physiology, 
if you refuse to admit all the other arguments on behalf of abstinence, you must 
admit that the temporal and spiritual benefit of others is good and sufficient reason 
why articles of even real utility should be cheerfully resigned ; for otherwise the 
example of the Saviour is a visionary ideal, and all talk of self-denial nothing better 
than hypocritical 'profession,' or self-deception." In dealing with Christian oppo- 
nents, then, the Pauline principle is a valuable argumentum ad hominem ; and 
where the heart appealed to is imbued with a genuine Christian benevolence, such 
an appeal, if intelligently apprehended, can hardly fail to be successful. 



Chapter XIV. Verses 22, 23. 

22 Hast thou faith ? have it to thyself before God. Happy is he 
that condemneth not himself in that thing which he alloweth. 23 And 
he that doubteth is damned if he eat, because he eateth not of faith : 
for whatsoever is not of faith is sin. 



The apostle is here addressing himself to one who asserts that he has ' faith ' in 
the lawfulness of eating what has been or may have been associated with idolatrous 
rites ; and he advises, ' Have this faith to thyself before God,' for he is happy who 
does not condemn himself — i. e. is not condemned by his conscience — in the thing 
that he allows ; but, on the contrary, he who ' doubts ' — he who exercises casuistry 
{ho diakrinomenos'), fearing evil in what he eats — is ' damned ' — i. e. is condemned* 
{katakekritai) — in eating, because he has no ' faith ' — or conviction — that what he 
is doing is right ; ' for whatsoever is not of faith is sin,' — sin to the doer, because it 
is not done with a good conscience. The apostle does not say that whatever con- 
science approves is right (for conscience may be perverted or misinformed), but 
that what conscience does not approve cannot be right to the doer. False notions 
of ' Christian liberty ' have induced a wide-spread, growing, and most perni- 
cious fallacy on this subject. 

In all ages the question What is truth ? seems to have received an unhappy 
treatment. The claims of Truth are subordinated to the claims of the individual 
conscience, with all its whims, defects, and narrowness ! People refer constantly 
to their 'opinions,' as if they did not rest under the ultimate obligation of refer- 
ring their opinions to the facts and principles which are the only possible 
evidence of their being true. Even philosophers like Grote go so far as to make 
Truth into the varying perception of the percipient persons who 'trow' it, as 
if there were one truth for me and another for my neighbor ! The Universe, 
however, with its stern laws, vindicates the objective truth by punishing every 
individual transgressor. It never accommodates itself to the ' opinions ' of man- 
kind. Certainly, as St Paul argues, a man must follow his own sense of right, but 
no man has more enforced the solemn obligation of seeking the true Light, lest the 
fancy of the Individual should be the ignis fatuus of self-deception and of willing 
defect. The bearing of this principle upon the use of intoxicating liquors is 

* This word will show the plain reader how very different, because wider, is the ancient use of 
it compared with the modern. It is like the word ' drunken ' in this respect. 



ROMANS, XV. I — 3. 327 



manifest ; for the light now shed on the nature and effects of such beverages must 
increase the number of persons who cannot use them without misgiving ; and all 
such persons should be impressed with the declaration that they cannot be other 
than ' brought into judgment ' if, while in this state of moral indecision, they par- 
take of inebriating drinks.* 



Chapter XV. Verses i — 3. 

1 We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, 
and not to please ourselves. 2 Let every one of us please his neigh- 
bor for his good to edification. 3 For even Christ pleased not 
himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them that reproached 
thee fell on me. 



Most beautiful and Christ-like is the exhortation of ver. 1. Those who cannot 
partake of any particular kind of food with a good conscience are to abstain, and 
those who might conscientiously partake are not to do so if their example will be a 
snare to others, for the strong (diinatoi, 'the able 'fought to bear the infirmities 
(ta astheneemata, ' the weaknesses ') of the weak (ton adunaton, * of the unable '), 
and not to please themselves. How emphatically does this principle condemn 
those who boast that they take intoxicating drink ' because they like it ' ! — ' because 
they have a right to do what they please ' ! The true Christian's highest pleasure 
consists in what is most acceptable to Christ and most useful to man ; so ' let 
every one of us please his neighbor for his good (eis to agathon, for the neighbor's 
benefit) to edification ' — to the building up of the Christian character and of the 
Christian brotherhood as a Living Temple, all glorious with the beauty of holiness 
and lovingkindness. • For even Christ pleased not Himself.' As a man He had 
appetencies which might have been innocently gratified, considered in themselves, 
but they were not indulged — they were inflexibly and cheerfully restrained, — in 
order that the work of human redemption might be triumphantly carried out. 
How singular and suspicious, that while every day professed Christians are earnestly 
pleading the example of our Lord for drinking what they like, we never hear of 
their insisting upon His example of perfect self-denial ! Yet the Lord Jesus is the 
sublimest and most perfect example of self-denial the world has seen; He pleased 
not Himself sensuously, because He pleased His Father and Himself spiritually; 
and in exact proportion as His professed followers are like Him, they will not 
consult with flesh or fashion, with palate or custom, as to what should be done or 
left undone. If this standard were honestly applied to the question of using 
intoxicating liquors, and if no more strong drink were to be henceforward consumed 
merely to please the lower-self, who can doubt that the habitual use of it would 
rapidly disappear from the Christian world ? 



* ' What is a person to do, if he is in as much doubt whether it is lawful to abstain as he is 
whether it is lawful to drink ? ' Two answers may be given, — (i) that a question as to the lawful- 
ness of abstinence can hardly arise, except on the score of health, and then the best information 
must be sought ; and (2) that in a case of balanced doubts, the deciding motive may always be 
found by estimating the kind of influence most likely to be exerted, by either course, upon domestic, 
social, and religious life. 



THE FIRST EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE CORINTHIANS. 



Chapter V. Verses 6 — 8. 



6 Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven 
leaveneth the whole lump ? 7 Purge out therefore the old leaven, 
that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ 
our passover is sacrificed for us : 8 Therefore let us keep the feast, 
not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wicked- 
ness : but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. 



V. 6. A little leaven] Mikra zumee. Zumee, 'ferment,' answers to the 
Hebrew seor. Wiclif has ' witen ye not that a littl sourdouy apeirith al the goblet ? ' 
(corrupteth all the lump). 

V. 7. As YE are unleavened] Kathos este azumoi, 'as ye are unfermented'= 
uncorrupted. Tyndale's version gives ' swete breed ' ; so Cranmer's and the 
Geneva versions. 

For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us] The words huper 
heemon, 'for us,' are absent from all the ancient MSS. 

V. 8. But with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth] AW en 
azumois eilikrineias kai aleetheias, ' but with the unfermented (things) of sincerity 
and truth. ' 



This passage may be appropriately compared with Luke xiii. 21, where the 
penetrative and diffusive influence of leaven is used as an emblem of heavenly truth 
in its rapidity of operation; — here, ver. 6, the same qualities are ascribed to 
spiritual error. But ver. 7, — 'Purge out therefore the old leaven,' etc. — answers 
to the Saviour's warnings, and is founded on the well-known nature of ferment as 
the product and producer of corruption. [See Notes on Matt. xvi. 6, 12, and 
Luke xii. I.] Contact with evil is to be avoided, 'for a little leaven leavens the 
whole lump,' if allowed to work unchecked ; — probably a proverbial saying, like to 
the other, — ' Evil communications corrupt good manners.' But as this evil had 
begun to work in the Corinthian Christians, they were to 'purge it out,' that they 
might resemble an unleavened lump. Christ our passover (pascha = paschal-lamb) 
is sacrificed; and as the ancient sacrifice was to be eaten with unfermented cakes 
and bitter herbs, so must the great spiritual feast, in which the Lamb of God is set 
forth as the food of the soul, be observed, not with malice and wickedness — the 
leaven of the heart, — but with simplicity and truthfulness, the unperverted elements 
of a genuine Christian disposition. 



I CORINTHIANS, VI. 9 — II. 329 

Chapter V. Verse 11. 

But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man 
that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or 
a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner ; with such an one no not 
to eat. 



Or a drunkard] Ee methusos, ' or one who fills himself with drink ' = a hard 
drinker = a drunkard, but not necessarily a drunkard of the English type. The 
habitual bibber was not to be regarded as a 'brother,' though he might wish to 
pass as such ; nor was he to be associated with in the festivities of the church. 
Such persons were sure to be, as Jude afterwards describes, ' spots in their feasts 
of charity,' and ought to be shunned, lest the contagion of their example should 
breed a moral pest. 



Chapter VI. Verses 9 — 11. 

9 Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom 
of God ? Be not deceived : neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor 
adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, 
10 Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extor- 
tioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. » And such were some 
of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified 
in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God. 



V. 10. Nor drunkards] Oute methusoi, 'nor inordinate drinkers.' An 
excessive addiction to liquors — even such as would not readily, or at all, intoxicate 
— was a vice of the apostolic age, and one that abounded in Corinth, the most 
profligate city of Greece. 



In dissolute Corinth the gospel had become the power of God to the salvation 
of some who had been steeped in every form of sensuality and impurity. This 
text has been adduced to show that the gospel, without the intervention of Tem- 
perance societies, is equal to the reclamation of the intemperate. But it is never 
wise to set historical allusions against present and patent facts ; and no fact is 
more completely attested than this, — that for every drunkard reclaimed by the 
ordinary religious ministrations, direct Temperance efforts have reclaimed hundreds. 
Not the gospel, however, but the routine of religious instruction has been at fault, 
and mainly, because (1) the religious teachers have not gone to seek out the intem- 
perate who would not come to receive instruction ; and because (2) they have not 
pressed upon the intemperate the gospel principle of separation from the causes of 
their besetment. Corinthian drunkards, coming under the influence of the Gospel, 
would be necessarily drawn away from their former companions and associations, 
and be introduced into a new society, of which the watchword was, ' Let us go on 
unto perfection.' Where intemperance had been the result of an appetite for 
alcohol, the Corinthian convert would not be safe unless he put ' the mocker ' away 
from him altogether. The principle of abstinence from intoxicants, by whomsoever 
applied, is one recognized by the Gospel as the sine qua non of safety for the 
drunkard ; and without it there can be no reasonable hope that the appetite for 
strong drink will be overcome, or the divine life effectually nourished and matured 
in the once intemperate man. 
42 



330 ' I CORINTHIANS, VI. 12. 

Chapter VI. Verse 12. 

All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient : all 
things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power 
of any. 



All things are lawful unto me] Panta moi exestin, 'all (things) to me 
are possible ' ; i. e. 'I am able to do (the kind of actions referred to) without scruple 
as to their moral propriety \ ' These ' all things ' related to the use of meats which 
some persons regarded as being ceremonially unclean. A provincial divine has 
wrested this text from its moral association in order to prove the logical universal, 
that ' all physical things are lawful, and to be received with thanksgiving ' ; and to 
establish the special inference, ' The?-efore alcohol is lawful, and must not be 
denounced as a bad article ' ! A moment's reflection would have exhibited the 
absurdity of construing in a logical and absolute sense the simple and natural words 
of Paul, which have not the slightest allusion to the physiological qualities of food 
or drink. No one can believe that St Paul was discussing a question of regimen 
or health, and asserting his physical invulnerability to the action of poisons (which 
are included in 'all things '); * or, supposing him to have possessed a miraculous 
exemption from the operation of divinely appointed physical laws, that his pro- 
fessed disciples have inherited the privilege ! St Paul was arguing the moral 
quality of certain actions, and the duty of a given course of life, as his next words 
demonstrate; and to quote 'all (actions) are lawful for me,' in a universal sense, 
is not only to ' wrest the Scripture to our own hurt,' but to make the apostle con- 
tradict and abolish his own argument for the greater suitability and excellence of the 
conduct which he is explicitly enforcing upon the Corinthian church, and therefore 
implicitly upon the entire Christian world. 

But all** things are not expedient] AW ou panta sumpherei, 'but all 
things do not hold (or fit) together,' = do not edify or adapt themselves to profit — 
i. e. all things are not suitable. 

But 1 will not be brought under the power of any] A IP ouk ego 
exousiastheesomai hupo linos, ' but I will not allow myself to be mastered by any 
thing,' — i. e. I will not suffer any thing, however enticing, to induce me to act 
contrary to my conviction of what is best, or contrary to the interests committed to 
my trust. 

In the Notes on the Greek Testament, by the Rev. S. T. Bloomfield, D. D., of 
Sidney College, Cambridge (Fifth Ed. 1843), we find the following: — 

"Panta moi exestin, etc.] The best Commentators are agreed that these 
words are supposed (by an ellipsis) to be the words of an Objector, and such as 
were probably often used by those who wished to indulge in sensuality, and eating 
meats offered to idols, and who sought to justify it under the pretense of Christian 
liberty. By ' all things ' are meant all things which the Apostle has here in view ; 
i. e. all kinds of food. To this the answer is, alV ou panta sumpherei — where the 
alia has both a concessory and an exceptive force ; q. d. = ' True, all things are given 
to us to enjoy; but all meats are not expedient to be eaten, because they may throw 
a stumbling-block in the way of others.' The Apostle then repeats the objection, 
in order to answer it more effectually. The Commentators suppose a paronamasia 
with exesti (possible) ; q. d. = ' I have power over all meats, but none of them 
shall have power over me ' — i. e. so as to make me a slave to my appetites. 



* See Note on chap. be. 25, for the Vulgate use of omnibus, 'all things.' If the runners in the 
Grecian games abstained from ''all things' absolutely, then starvation was a preparation for 
strength ! 



I CORINTHIANS, VI. 1 9, 20. 33 1 

"V. 13. Meats for the belly. ] Esti, i. e. aneekei, 'are meant for.' Here the 
foregoing sentiment is further illustrated, and an objection anticipated; q. d. 'All 
aliments are meant for the sustenance of the body, and the body is fitted to the recep- 
tion and digestion of them.' Or rather it may be regarded, with some, as another 
argument of the opponent, containing an excuse for an indulgence in sensuality. 
. . . The words following, to de soma, etc. [now the body is not for fornica- 
tion. ] There was no direct answer (in the case of the bromata, meats) ; but, in 
fact, the argument needed none, as it would be like arguing from the use to the 
abuse of any thing. The Apostle, therefore, saves this, and replies to the apology 
in the peculiar case for which it was, no doubt, often pleaded — namely, fornication." 

In his supplemental volume Dr Bloomfield adds : 

"The first words (all are lawful to me) are those of an Excuser ; the next (but 
all are not fitting) are the Apostle's in reply. The view taken by Billroth of the 
purpose of the Apostle in these words is, I apprehend, quite correct, and it is sup- 
ported by the judgment of Calvin, who ably treats on the subject. There is no 
doubt that, of the extenuators of luxury and sensuality here alluded to, some went 
even to the extent of extenuating simple fornication, which was by the heathens 
regarded as, under certain restrictions [in moderation], lawfid as well as natural. 
Accordingly, these Corinthian pleaders for vice, maintained that it was to be 
reckoned among things indifferent; thus making Christian liberty a cloak, or 
occasion, for licentiousness." 

It is singular that such a text should ever be selected for preaching the lawful- 
ness of gratification and pleasure to the world. Yet we have before us a pro-drink 
sermon preached on this passage — the argument of which is based solely upon 
that part of the text which contains the motto of the Sensualist to be answered, 
while it ignores entirely the Apostolic reply, which teaches the unsuitableness and 
sinfulness of the course attempted to be justified, and its utter antagonism to the 
ends of the Christian Life. 



Chapter VI. Verses 19, 20. 

19 What ? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy 
Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your 
own ? 20 For ye are bought with a price : therefore glorify God in 
your body, and in your spirit, which are God's. 



The solemn and glorious fact here declared should cause every Christian to exer- 
cise the utmost care in rejecting whatever may, directly or indirectly, pollute the 
' temple of the Holy Spirit ' ; for even the body, by its union with the soul, is con- 
sidered a fit dwelling-place of God. Nor is such a fact altogether beyond our 
comprehension, since the reciprocal relation of body and mind is too constant and 
intimate not to impress us with the importance of guarding the purity of the latter, 
by excluding from its material tenement whatever may becloud or deprave it. 
Whatever stimulates animal appetite, and abates the vigor of the intellectual and 
moral nature, is unsuitable for the Christian's use, because not fitting to his high 
calling and his consecration as 'a temple of the Holy Ghost.' How can he wisely, 
or even complacently, consume the wine and strong drink which the Aaronic priests 
were forbidden to use, and introduce into the temple of the Holy Spirit that which 
the Spirit himself has branded as a 'mocker ' and ' seducer' ? However limited in 
quantity, the use can serve no sanctifying purpose, and may gradually create for 
alcoholic liquors (as it has done in innumerable instances) a taste morbid in its 
physical character, and pestiferous to every attribute of the rational and spiritual 
being. 



332 I CORINTHIANS. 



Chapter VIII. Verses 4 — 13. 

4 As concerning therefore the eating of those things that are 
offered in sacrifice unto idols, we know that an idol is nothing in the 
world, and that there is none other God but one. 5 For though there 
be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, (as there be 
gods many, and lords many,) 6 But to us there is but one God, the 
Father, of whom are all things, and we in him ; and one Lord Jesus 
Christ, by whom are all things, and we by him. 7 Howbeit there is 
not in every man that knowledge : for some with conscience of the 
idol unto this hour eat it as a thing offered unto an idol ; and their 
conscience being weak is defiled. 8 But meat commendeth us not to 
God : for neither, if we eat, are we the better ; neither, if we eat not, 
are we the worse. 9 But take heed lest by any means this liberty of 
yours become a stumbling-block to them that are weak. 10 For if any 
man see thee which hast knowledge sit at meat in the idol's temple, 
shall not the conscience of him which is weak be emboldened to eat 
those things which are offered to idols; u And through thy knowl- 
edge shall the weak brother perish, for whom Christ died ? 12 But 
when ye sin so against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, 
ye sin against Christ. 13 Wherefore, if meat make my brother to 
offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my 
brother to offend. 



In these paragraphs the apostle deals with a question on which he had evidently 
been consulted. The question consisted of two parts, — Was it right to eat of food 
that had been devoted to idols ? Was it right to set an example of eating it to 
those who believed that to eat was to contract defilement ? The first part of the 
question the apostle answers in the affirmative, the second in the negative. The 
use of the terms ' lawful ' and ' expedient ' by the English translators has very 
much confused St Paul's reasoning to the common mind, and conveyed a wholly 
fallacious notion of lawfulness as distinct from expediency, — the utter absurdity 
that what is not expedient to be done may still be lawfully done ! Such a con- 
struction runs counter to the apostle's clear intention to distinguish between certain 
acts so far as they regard the doer, and so far as they regard others. He asserts, 
what is quite plain, that there are many acts which, so far as they relate to the 
doer, are not intrinsically wrong or in any way injurious, and therefore are per- 
missible ; but which may exert an injurious influence upon others, and therefore are 
not permissible under the Christian law of love. To infer that these actions are 
'lawful,' though 'inexpedient,' nullifies all that the apostle teaches; for if 'inex- 
pedient,' i. e. unprofitable and unsuitable in a Christian sense, they cease to be 
lawful to Christian men. /irrespective of circumstances they would be innocent, 
but circumstantially they are attended with harm, and therefore must not be done. 
The words used by the apostle to express this difference are exesti, ' what is per- 
missible ' in a j^-regarding sense ; on sumpherei, ' what is not advantageous ' 
in respect to others. His conclusion on the particular question submitted to him 
was, that a Christian might eat food offered to idols without committing sin in the 
simple act; but that it was not to be eaten when calculated to lead fellow-Christians 
to violate their consciences by eating it. This would be to convert personal 
liberty into a stumbling-block to the weak ones {asthenousin) — i. e. those who had 
not strength of mind to discern that an idol was nothing. But to cast such a 



I CORINTHIANS, IX. 7, 1 9, 2$. 333 

stumbling-block in a brother's way was to sin against him, and hence to sin against 
Christ ! — so completety was the apostle incapable of recognising the lawfulness of 
acts unprofitable and injurious to his brethren in the Lord. His conclusion (ver. 13) 
is the inevitable issue of all that he has affirmed: — "Wherefore, if meat (broma, 
food) make my brother to offend {skandalizei, ensnares him), I will eat no flesh 
{krea) while the world standeth (eis ton aidna, during the age, the whole Christian 
dispensation), lest I make my brother to offend (hina mee ton adelphon mou skan- 
daliso, so that I should not cause my brother to be ensnared)." [For the apostolic 
argument, in its application to the Temperance reform, see Notes on chap. x. 
22 — 30; Rom. xiv. 13 — 23; xv. I — 3.] 



Chapter IX. Verse 7. 

Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges ? who planteth a 
vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? o r who feedeth a flock, 
and eateth not of the milk of the flock ? 



A vineyard] Ampelona, 'a vineyard.' The inquiry of the apostle is a partial 
quotation from Deut. xx. 6. As to ' eating of the fruit ' of the vineyard, see Note 
on 2 Kings xviii. 31. 



Chapter IX. Verse 19. 

For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant 
unto all, that I might gain the more. 



If the apostle could honestly say this of himself, how confidently may we suppose 
that he would, were he living among us, eagerly avail himself of the Temperance 
reform as a means of ' gaining ' the multitudes of our people who are the slaves 
of appetite, and who need to be delivered from that bondage before they can 
pass onward to the land of everlasting promise ! He who daily made himself the 
servant — rather, 'slave' — of all ('I have enslaved myself to all,' pasin emauton 
edoulosa), that he might win over some to the benign service of his Master, would 
not have thought it a hard trial of appetite or patience to renounce the fiery and 
heady beverages of Britain, that the drink-possessed ones, restored to their right 
mind, might sit in grateful devotion at the Saviour's feet. 



Chapter IX. Verse 25. 

And every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all 
things. Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown ; but we an 
incorruptible. 



Wiclif has « absteyneth hym fro alle thingis,' in which he is followed by Tyndale, 
Cranmer, and the Geneva version. The Rheims V. has ' refraineth himself from 
all things.' The Vulgate has omnis autem qui in agora cofttendit, ab omnibus se 
abstinet, 'but every one who strives in the agora holds himself back from all things ' 
— i. e. all things hurtful. 

And every man that striveth for the mastery] Pas de ho agonizomenos, 
'and every one who is a combatant,' the allusion being to the competitors in the 
Isthmian games celebrated at Corinth. 



334 I CORINTHIANS, IX. 25. 

Is temperate IN ALL things] Panta enkrateuetai, ' in all things (or wholly) 

controls himself.' Dr Whitby, in his Notes, renders this clause, 'observing a 

strict abstinence.' 'Extreme temperance, and even abstinence, was required,' 

says Dr Bloomfield. Dr A. Clarke, "This was a regimen for both quantity and 

quality, and they carefully abstained from all things that might render them less 

able for the combat; whence the apostle says they were ' temperate in all things.' " 

The commentators give abundant illustrative references to various ancient authors, 

but two must here suffice. Epictetus (a. D. 100), in his Enckeiridion, chap. 35, 

remarks, " Do you wish to gain a prize in the Olympic games ? Consider the 

requisite preparations and the consequences. You must observe a strict regimen, 

must live on food which you dislike ; you must abstain from all delicacies ; must 

exercise yourself at the necessary and prescribed times both in heat and in cold ; 

you must not drink what is cold, nor wine as was your custom {mee oinon hos 

etuchen) ; in a word you must put yourself under the directions of a pugilist as 

you would under those of a physician, and afterward enter the lists." Horace, 

in his Ars Poetica, has the well-known lines, — 

" Qui studet optatam cursu contingere tnetam, 
Multa tulitfecitquepuer; sudavit et alsit I 
Abstinuit Venere et Baccho." 

Translated by Dr Francis as follows : 

" The youth who hopes the Olympic prize to gain, 
All arts must try, and every toil sustain ; 
The extremes of heat and cold must often prove, 
And shun the weakening joys of wine and love." 

Horace's terse expression is, ' He abstains from Venus and Bacchus,' using the 
names of the heathen deities to personify the indulgences they were supposed to 
patronize. The training practised by modern runners, pugilists, etc., conforms in 
many points to the ancient customs, not least in the disuse or extremely sparing 
use of the weakest fermented liquors. The training school is free from the popular 
fallacy which confounds strong liquor with strengthening drink.* 

1. It is singular that precisely the verse in the Bible which lends whatever sanc- 
tion it involves to abstinence from intoxicating liquors, is the one that ignorant 
readers most commonly allege in favor of using them ; and this abuse of Scripture 
is usually associated with the further error of turning a simple reference to a well- 
known fact into an apostolic command, as if the passage had read, 'Ye shall 
be temperate in all things ' ! It is to be regretted that the A. V. should, in this 
instance, have needlessly departed from the more explicit rendering of all the older 
versions, thereby sanctioning a popular fallacy pregnant with evil to the world, and 
fostering the pleasing delusion that the use of intoxicating liquor is indispensable to 
the exercise of the virtue of temperance ! 

2. The apostle has often been described as a strong opponent of the asceticism 
taught in Colosse and other parts of Asia Minor (Col. ii. 20 — 23); and if we accept 
this view, so much the more impressive becomes the comparison here instituted 
between the candidate in the Grecian games and the Christian convert. St Paul 
affirms that the physical athletes ' do it ' — i. e. are ' temperate in all things ' — in 
order ' to obtain a corruptible crown ' — a perishing wreath of leaves ; but that 



sary 



" The best trainers entirely prohibit the use of beer, wine, and spirits during the trainin 
for the prize-fighter." — Buckmaster's ' Elements of Physiology,' p. 161 (London, 1866). 



training neces- 



x. 4, 7, 12—14. 335 

'we,' the Christian candidates, do it for 'an incorruptible crown' — a glorious 
wreath ' that fadeth not away. ' Applying this principle of self-restraint to himself, 
how affecting are his admonitory words ! — "/therefore so run, not uncertainly 
(adeelds, irresolutely) ; so fight I, not as one that beateth the air : but I keep under 
my body (alP hupopiazo mou to soma, ' but I press my body under ' : the hupo- 
piazo is said to have been a technical phrase for striking under the eye = punishing 
severely), and bring it into subjection (doulagogo, lead it as a slave), lest having 
preached to others I myself should be a castaway (adokimos genomai, should be- 
come a 'disapproved' one — i. e. a rejected candidate)." 

3. It is not a just principle of interpretation to carry mere illustration into every 
detail. We must not, in this case, insist upon a literal correspondence of the 
regimen required. The essential points are these: — (1) The Christian (like the 
Grecian competitor) is called upon to exercise appropriate physical discipline — 
not to consult bodily ease, but bodily service. (2) This must be done in order that 
fleshly appetites may be subjected to the dictates of reason and of the spiritual 
nature ; because (3) on the fact of this subjection depends the successful termination 
of the Christian's course, be he private member, public pastor, or even apostle! 
If, then, intoxicating liquors are not profitable to the body — as the illustration of 
the apostle supposes, and as experience proves ; if, moreover, they are a provocative 
to the sensual affections, and expose even the most careful user to some peril which 
might be shunned, how can abstinence from them be wisely excluded from the 
conditions under which the Christian race is to be run, and the Christian victory 
achieved ? 



Chapter X. Verse 4. 

4 And did all drink the same spiritual drink : for they drank of 
that spiritual Rock that followed them : and that Rock was Christ. 



The historical event on which the apostle founds this sublime spiritual allegory 
is described in Exod. xvii. I — 7, and Numb. xx. I — 13. So inestimable was the 
boon conferred by the stream which burst from the rock of Horeb, that it might 
well typify the blessings of Christ's redemption. The apostle's statement that the 
Rock followed them — that is, the water from the Rock — completes the similitude 
so far as it relates to the continual affluence of Christ's grace throughout our mortal 
pilgrimage. 



[V. 7. See Note on Exod. xxxii. 6, under Additional Notes, p. 249.] 



Chapter X. Verses 12 — 14. 

12 Wherefore let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he 
fall. 13 There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common 
to man : but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted 
above that ye are able ; but will with the temptation also make a 
way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it h Wherefore, my 
dearly beloved, flee from idolatry. 



336 I CORINTHIANS, X. 23 — 30. 

It is not enough to think or know we are ' standing ' ; continual care must be 
observed, or a fall may follow ; and such needfulness is never more properly 
displayed than by the avoidance of that which has caused priest and prophet, the 
wise and the good alike, to stumble and err. Only where this watchfulness exists 
can any ' temptation ' or trial from without, that God permits, become endurable, 
resistible, and therefore promotive of spiritual advancement. Instead of this 
consideration engendering vain confidence (as when persons boast of their security 
in the use of strong drink), it is a reason for fleeing all idolatry, and all incentives 
to it, whether it be the idolatry of ' dumb idols,' or of ' fleshly lusts that war against 
the soul.' 



Chapter X. Verses 23 — 30. 

23 All things are lawful for me, but all things are not expedient : all 
things are lawful for me, but all things edify not. 24 Let no man seek 
his own, but every man another's wealth. 25 Whatsoever is sold in 
the shambles, that eat, asking no question for conscience sake : 26 For 
the earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof. 27 If any of them 
that believe not bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed to go ; what- 
soever is set before you, eat, asking no question for conscience sake. 
28 But if any man say unto you, This is offered in sacrifice unto idols, 
eat not for his sake that shewed it, and for conscience sake : for the 
earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof: 29 Conscience, I say, not 
thine own, but of the other : for why is my liberty judged of another 
man's conscience ? 30 For if I by grace be a partaker, why am I evil 
spoken of for that for which! give thanks ? 



V. 29. Conscience, I say, not thine own, but of the other] That is, not 
only of thine own, but also of thy brother. We must respect the moral sense of our 
neighbor as well as our own sense of right ; and especially must we forego acting 
upon a negative conviction where it would be likely to induce a discord between 
opinion and practice in another. Through obedience to his own conviction the 
Christian will learn to reverence the conscientious dictates of others, for his own 
sensibility to the claims of duty will become the measure of his respect for his 
neighbors. It must be recollected, however, that no apology for pleasure and 
self-gratification can ever be elevated into the sphere of ' conscience ' ; it is but an 
elaborate self-deception for a slaveholder or a drinker to plead a ' conscientious 
conviction ' in favor of slavery and sensuality. F. D. Huntington, D. D., well 
observes that "consent to a general statement of a principle is one thing, while 
a courageous loyalty to its personal requirements is another. There may be a wide 
gap between the storehouse where we keep a supply of respectable abstract notions, 
loosely laid away for quotation — something between the earnestness of conviction 
and the inconvenient disrepute of scepticism, — on the one hand, and the living 
embodiment of these notions in a self-denying practice on the other. It is easy 
enough to agree that we ought not to weaken and damage and degrade other men's 
consciences; but to give up the gratification, the amusement, the pleasant and 
otherwise harmless habit which will certainly damage and mislead them, is not 
always very easy. Besides, there are some questions of right, how far, in particular 
cases, this ought to be done. These questions may really complete the matter to 
honest minds, or they may only furnish a subterfuge for cowardly and evasive 



I CORINTHIANS, XL I. 337 

natures to escape a disagreeable sacrifice, without at the same time losing all self- 
respect by abandoning the general principle. The New Testament takes pains to 
provide directions for a settlement of both these classes of difficulties. Whether it 
will be of any use to appeal to that source of instruction will depend on another 
point — viz., whether we have determined to make the spirit and word of the New 
Testament, when we have found them out, the law of our lives, let them cut in 
upon whatever comfort or indulgence they may. The Christian faith is eminently a 
social principle. . . . If it declares, in one breath, that ' every man shall bear 
his own burden,' in the next it says, 'Bear ye one another's burdens.' It predicts 
an infinite misery for them that tempt, betray, misguide, deprave one another, — 
for them that form companies, clubs, societies, to make each other frivolous, pro- 
fligate, dissolute. It treats with terrible severity any one that presumes to reply, 
when called to reckon for such outrages, ' Am I my brother's keeper ? ' — virtually 
rejoining, 'Yes, you are, all men are each other's keepers, educators, helpers or 
hinderers, saviours or seducers.' It requires all to give, not only food, clothes, 
and money, but the ministry of encouraging words, patient endurance, honest 
living, aspiring thoughts. So, negatively, it forbids theft and killing ; and if we 
study the whole religion through and through, we shall see that this means the 
robbery of any particle of virtue, honor, temperance, truth, the killing of the 
spiritual and immortal part, quite as much as the theft of a garment, or the murder 
of the body it covers. In fact, all the pages of our Book of Faith are marked with 
these earnest counsels and expostulations about caring for other souls. It is always 
adjuring us to work for, to suffer for, and to that end to love, other people. Such 
is the compass of its charity. Whether it commands or forbids, its intent is the 
same. Prohibitions and injunctions run into each other, and are only the two sides 
of one bright truth, the positive and the negative being only measurements in 
opposite directions of the universal law of affection and service. The lives of the 
apostles were, throughout, consecrated, abstemious, self-sacrificing labors for the 
souls of their fellow-men. . . . The silent decree within will reaffirm the 
living oracles of the evangelists. Together they will pronounce him to be the only 
truly conscientious man who is ever applying the discriminations of his sense of 
right to new regions, new connections, new questions of conduct, and will pronounce 
that it must be a very limited conscience indeed which only inquires, of a course of 
action, how it will affect the individual performing it." — ('Christian Believing and 
Living,' Sermon xxii.) 



Chapter X, Verses 31 — 33. 

31 Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all 
to the glory of God. 32 Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor 
to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God : 33 Even as I please all 
men in all things, not seeking mine own profit, but the. profit of many, 
that they may be saved. 



Chapter XL Verse i. 
Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. 



The ' glory of God ' should be the great end of all rational action, eating and 
drinking among the rest ; that is to say, all that is done by the creature should 
have a tendency to show forth, and to carry out, the beneficent design of the 
43 



338 I CORINTHIANS, XI. 20 — 22, 33, 34. 

Creator ; for the glory of God is His goodness — that ' goodness ' which comprehends 
all that is just and true and gracious in the essential harmony of the Divine Attri- 
butes. Unless, then, the use of intoxicating liquors, and the traffic in them, can 
be proved to conform to this supreme rule of all right action, they are put under 
the ban of the highest law ; nor is it enough for any one person to conclude that 
his use of strong drink is compatible with the Divine glory. The tendencies of 
actions, as developed in general experience, are ' fruits ' by which we are to judge 
them; and strangely constituted must he be who can perceive any connection 
between the drinking habits of this country and the glory of God, save a connection 
of opposition and defiance. One important method of doing what is possible for the 
glory of God is explained, chap. x. 32, " Give none offence (aproskopoi ginesthe, be 
causes of stumbling), neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church 
of God " — a triumphant repudiation and refutation of the pretence that Paul limits 
his principle (not to eat or drink what is an occasion of stumbling) to the case 
of Christian brethren.* [See Note on Rom. xiv. 21.] In ver. 34 the apostle 
declares that in carrying out this principle he would not merely resign any abstract 
liberty he might claim, but would sacrifice even his own profit, seeking not his own 
advantage (to etnautou sumpkeron), but that of 'the many,' so that they might be 
saved. Then follows the grand practical application injudiciously severed from 
chap, x., and made the commencement of chap. xi. = * Be ye followers (mimeetai, 
imitators) of me, as also I am of Christ.' The apostle could advise the Corin- 
thians to look to the profit of all, not only because he had himself done it, but 
because it had been done by one greater than Paul, even by their Lord and his 
Lord, who had exemplified to the uttermost the spirit of self-denial for the benefit 
of man and the glory of God. 



Chapter XI. Verses 20 — 22, 33, 34. 

20 When ye come together therefore into one place, this is not to 
eat the Lord's supper. 21 For in eating every one taketh before 
other his own supper : and one is hungry, and another is drunken. 
22 What ? have ye not houses to eat and to drink in ? or despise ye 
the church of God, and shame them that have not ? What shall I 

say to you ? shall I praise you in this ? I praise you not 

33 Wherefore, my brethren, when ye come together to eat, tarry one 
for another. 34 And if any man hunger, let him eat at home; that 
ye come not together unto condemnation. And the rest will I set in 
order when I come. 



* The history of European intercourse with uncivilized tribes, like the North American Indians 
and New Zealanders, and with peculiarly civilized nations, such as Hindoos and Chinese, is 
replete with rank and noisome offences against the apostolic rule of practice— a rule as obligatory 
on nations as on individuals. Every British Christian must blush for his country when he reads 
what was said by the venerable Bishop Selwyn at a public meeting in England (1867):— "The 
people of the New Zealand race stood out for many years against the temptations to intoxication. 
In the statistical statement published in the town of Wellington, many years after the settlement 
was formed, after describing a number of convictions for various offences, including the offence of 
drunkenness, there was a foot-note added to the effect that intoxication was almost unknown 
among the native people. I cannot say it is so now. But if the native people of New Zealand 
have given way to the sin of intoxication, from whom would God require an account of their sin ? 
It was not a sift of native growth ; it was an imported, an exotic sin. They stood against it for 
a time, but as their faith failed, they gave way to the temptation forced ufon them by their 
English brethren." 



I CORINTHIANS, XI. 20 — 22, 33, 34. 339 

V. 20. Into one place] Epi to auto, ' to the same (place) ' = the place of 
public assembly, and, as the reference implies, upon the first day of the week. 

This is not to eat the Lord's supper] Ouk estl Kuriakon deipnon phagein, 
'it is not to eat the supper pertaining-to-the-Lord.' Kuriakon (from kurios, 'lord') 
is here used to define the character of our deipnon, as distinct from an ordinary 
meal, and as consecrated to the memory of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 
The word occurs in only one other place in the New Testament, and with the same 
application (Rev. i. 10, 'I was in the Spirit on the Lord's day' — en tee kuriakee 
heemera, 'in the day of the Lord,' i. e. the day consecrated to the memory of His 
resurrection, as the Kuriakon deipnon was consecrated to the memory of His last 
supper). Deipnon, ' supper,' among the Orientals, was the principal meal of the 
day, answering to the English ' dinner ' ; and, like it, was generally taken either at 
noon or in the afternoon, but among the more fashionable classes in the evening 
of the day. St Paul, in anticipation of the complaint he is about to make, states 
that, though the professed object of the Corinthians' assembling was the celebration 
of the Lord's supper, the abuses connected with that sacred feast had made it 
something wholly different in a spiritual sense. 

V. 21. For in eating every one taketh before other his own supper] 
Hekastos gar to idion deipnon prolambanei en to phagein, 'for in eating {en to phagein 
= in the act of eating) each one takes-before-another (i. e. snatches up) his own 
supper-provision.' Codex A reads pros lam banei, 'take to himself; Codex D has 
epi to phagein, 'at the (time of) eating.' Deipnon, 'supper,' is figuratively used 
for the materials composing it. As described by Xenophon (Memorabilia, iii. 
14) and other authors, meetings called eranoi (club-feasts) were common among 
the Greeks, when each person brought his own food ; and as these meetings were 
designed to express and promote a friendly sentiment, the poorer members would 
often have their scanty supplies increased out of the abundance of the richer. 
Sometimes these eranoi took the form of benefit clubs, and the meetings would 
then resemble those of our friendly societies on club nights, — save that tippling 
' for the good of the house ' was unknown. Later on, these social church gather- 
ings were known as agapai (Latin, agapce), 'love-feasts,' and were too frequently 
the occasion of great abuses.* In the early Corinthian church the social eranos 
had become mixed up with the Christian eucharist, and in such a way as to call for 
apostolic reprehension and correction. Instead of the members waiting till all had 
arrived, and till the meal was devotionally commenced, those who arrived first 
spread their provisions and began to eat them up, and in an eager, selfish manner, 
as if afraid they might be called upon to part with any for the accommodation of 
the less sumptuously provided. Thus good order and decency were disregarded, 
while the solemnity of the occasion and the spirit of brotherly affection were com- 
pletely outraged. Nor was this all. To disorder, irreverence, and illiberality, was 
joined, on the part of some at least, an excessive indulgence in the food that ought 
to have been generally shared with others. 

And one is hungry, and another is drunken] Kai hos men peina, hos de 
methuei, ' and one, indeed, is hungry, but another is over-filled ' = gorged. The 
wealthier members having consumed their provisions, those who came in afterward, 
or had but little at first, remained hungry, while the others were surcharged. This 
explanation has been adopted by the whole body of expositors, ancient and modern. 
Webster and Wilkinson, however, in their 'New Testament with Notes,' suggest 

* St Jude (a. d. 66), referring to the ' men who had crept in unawares,' describes them (ver. 12) 
as • spots in your feasts of charity ' — en tats agapais humon spilades ; and St Peter (2 Ep. ii. 13) 
plainly alludes to the same licentious intruders. 



340 I CORINTHIANS, XI. 20—22, 33, 34. 

that peina is here used in the sense of ravenous over food, — L e. gluttonous, — the 
meaning then being, ' one, indeed, is voracious (over the meat), and another goes 
to excess (over the drink). ' As supporting this notion, they quote ver. 34, ei de tis 
peina, ' and if any man hunger, let him eat at home,' where the hunger is evidently 
not the hunger of poverty, but eagerness for food. This conjecture is ingenious, 
and the argument plausible; and it is no valid reply that the whole host of 
theologians must have been in error if these critics are right. That the whole 
body of critics should have been mistaken on such a point of translation is, no 
doubt, very improbable, yet not impossible. We feel, however, compelled to 
dissent from these novel interpreters, for several reasons. (1) They adduce no 
passage, from any other author, where peina bears the peculiar sense of 'hungry 
indulgence in food,' as distinguished from methuei, 'indulgence in drink.' Had 
such a distinction been intended by St Paul, he could hardly have failed to use 
some other and less ambiguous word, such as empipleemi, answering to the Hebrew 
sahva. (2) The construction of the sentence clearly implies a distinction of persons 
between ' the one ' who was peina, and ' the other ' who was methuei, — yet, on 
Messrs Webster and Wilkinson's hypothesis, one and the same person would, in 
many cases, have been both; for those who ate their food to excess, would hardly 
be the parties likely to use the drink they had brought, with less eagerness and 
immoderation. (3) The tis peina, 'one that is hungry,' — referred to in ver. 34 — 
who is told to eat at home, is not necessarily the same man as he who is said to be 
'hungry' in ver. 20. The tis peina of ver. 34 might fitly refer (and, as it seems to 
us, does refer) to the one who, being hungry at first, had snatched up his food and 
greedily devoured it; whereas the hos peina of ver. 20 was plainly one who 
remained 'hungry' after the meal was finished. There seems, therefore, no 
sufficient reason for departing from the ordinary understanding of this phrase, 
which yields an excellent and harmonious sense, in favor of an interpretation 
neither demanded by the context, nor justified by the usage of language. 

Assuming, then, that the correct translation of hos peina is, ' one is hungry,' 
what is the exact sense of methuei, translated ' drunken ' ? The answer is invested 
with special interest, because the passage has often been alleged in support of the 
use of intoxicating wine at the Lord's Supper in the present day. " Such wine," 
it is said, "was used by the Corinthians without apostolic correction, and may, 
therefore, be used by us." But (1) if the Corinthians deviated from the original 
custom, their conduct is no precedent for us, and the generally supposed result of 
that departure is more of a warning than an example. (2) Nor can it be concluded 
that the apostle must have condemned their deviation from the primitive pattern, 
for he says nothing concerning their use of fermented bread, which was probably 
the kind used at their ordinary eranoi, and certainly was not the kind used at the 
institution of the Lord's Supper. (3) Nor is it to be hastily inferred that the same 
kind of bread and wine was used, both at the eranos, or common meal, and at the 
celebration of the Supper ; and it was concerning the first, and not the second, that 
the phrase hos de methuei, ' and another is drunken,' is used by the apostle. 
As to the sense borne by methuei in this place, we remark, — 
1. The exposition which imputes 'drunkenness' (in our sense) to the Corinthian 
Christians at their social meal, implies that many of the members were guilty of the 
awful sin of celebrating the Lord's Supper (which followed that meal) while in an 



I CORINTHIANS, XL 20 — 22, 33, 34. 341 

inebriated condition, — an imputation highly improbable in itself, and tacitly con- 
tradicted by the language of the apostle, who does not proceed to condemn (as 
we should suppose he would have condemned) in strong language, so foul an 
insult to the eucharist, while he simply inquires (ver. 21) whether they had not 
houses to eat and to drink in ; and (ver. 34) bids them satisfy their hunger at home, 
in order to avoid both the indecorum that had been exhibited, and the condemna- 
tion to which it had exposed them. 

2. Methuei being used as antithetical to peina, 'hungry,' requires to be under- 
stood in the generic sense of 'satiated,' and not in the restricted and emphatic 
sense of ' intoxicated. ' That St Paul should have thus employed it is in harmony 
with the fact that he was familiar with the Lxx. translation of the Old Testament, 
where such a use of the word repeatedly occurs.* Such a double use of the word 
has its exact parallel in the Scottish dialect. Walter Scott quotes the proverb, ' It's 
hard to stand between a, fou man and z. fasting* — where 'fou' means full, though 
it would be easy to cite many examples of ' fou ' having the secondary sense of 
'drunken.' The 'over-filled' man forms the precise contrast to the 'hungry' 
one, while a schoolboy can perceive that no proper contrast is offered by the state- 
ment that one was 'hungry' and another 'drunken.' 

3. The great majority of expositors join in ascribing to the apostle's words a 
charge of selfish repletion, but not of intoxication. Clement of Alexandria ren- 
ders methuei as ' full ' {Peed. ii. ). Chrysostom views it as comprehending both 
eating and drinking, and as more emphatically contrasting the state of the poorer 
with that of the richer classes at the feast. Bengel sententiously puts the case, 
Alter plus justo habet sibi, alter minus, ' one has for himself more than is his due, 
another less.' Dr Hammond, in his paraphrase, explains methuei', 'feeds to the 
full.' Dr Gill's note runs thus — "He that came late had nothing to eat, and so 
was hungry; while he that was first, either ate and drank to excess, or at least very 
plentifully, so that he was very cheerful, and more disposed to carnal mirth, than 
in a serious and solemn manner to partake of the Lord's Supper." Dr Lightfoot 
is of opinion " that by him that was drunken is meant the Jew that ate the Paschal 
Supper, of which he ate and drank freely ; and by him that was hungry, the Gen- 
tile who was so, not out of poverty and necessity, but because he refused and 
avoided eating of the ante-supper, as savoring of Judaism, and so here was a 
schism and a division among them." Dr Macknight renders methuei, 'is plen- 
tifully fed.' Archbishop Newcome, in his 'Revised Translation' (1796), says: — 
"And the poor man scarcely satisfied his hunger, while the rich indulged to excess. 
The word methuei does not necessarily import drunkenness." Dr A. Clarke, in his 
Commentary, states, "Some ate to excess, others had scarcely enough to suffice 
nature. Methuei, was filled to the full ; this is the sense of the word in many places 

* We subjoin seven testimonies from a large number before us : 

Gen. xliii. 34, And Joseph's brethren ' were merry with him ' {emethustlieesan mef auton). 

Psa. xxii. 7, ' And thy cup runneth over' — is full to the brim (methuskon). 

Psa. xxxvi. 8, 'They shall be abundantly satisfied (methustheesontai) with the fatness of Thy 
house.' 

Psa. Ixv. 10, ' Saturate {metkusonS her furrows.' 

Jer. xxxi. 14, ' I will satiate (met/iuso) the soul of my priests with fatness.' 

Cant. v. 1, ' Drink and be satiated ' {piete kai methustheete). 

Prov. v. 19, ' Let her breasts satisfy thee ' {methusketdsan). Version of Aquila, a.d. 160. 

A large collection of such texts, illustrating the usage of metkuo, will be found in the ' Works of 
Dr Lees,' vol. ii., showing its application to food, to milk, to water, to blood, and to oil, as well as 
to wine. 



342 I CORINTHIANS, XI. 20 — 22, 33, 34. 

of Scripture." Dr Bloomfield, in his Notes, remarks, "The sense is literally, 'he 
is well soaked with drink,' a sense of methuei also occurring in John ii. 10. See 
Note on this passage.* That drunkenness, however, is not here meant is plain 
from what is said in the next words, ' Have ye not all houses to eat and to drink 
(not get drunk) in ? '" Dr Halley, in his work on the Sacraments, gives this excel- 
lent reversed interpretation : — * While the rich feasted, others, and especially the 
poor, were hungry ' (i. p. 46). Meyer, followed by Alford, inclines to give to 
methuei the darkest shade of which it is susceptible. Dean Stanley more 
cautiously says, "The use of this word in John ii. 10 shows that it need not be 
always taken of intoxication, but this is its natural meaning in most passages," 
and he refers to passages of the N. T., in some of which the unforced meaning is 
simply that of excessive indulgence of the appetite. 

The apostle's complaint against a portion, and apparently not a small portion, 
of the Corinthian church, maybe thus paraphrased in modern language: — "When 
you assemble in your accustomed place of meeting on the Lord's day, you do so 
avowedly to partake of the Lord's Supper, but in reality you do not celebrate it in 
a manner deserving the name. . For those who arrive first, having produced their 
provisions, begin to eat as at a common meal; so eagerly and selfishly that, while 
one member of the church remains hungry and unsatisfied, and has his poverty 
exposed, another is filled to absolute satiety. Now have you not houses in which 
eating and drinking can be carried on ? Why convert the house of worship, dedicated 
to 'brotherly love,' into a place of selfish and sensual feasting ? Can it be that you 
despise the church of God, and wish to put to shame your less affluent brethren, 
who have not your means of satisfying their physical appetites ? What shall I say 
to you? Shall I commend you for such conduct? I do not commend you." 
[Having described the institution of the Lord's Supper in order to impress the 
Corinthians with the solemnity proper to its observance, he returns to their ill- 
behavior, ver. 33, 34.] "Let it therefore, my brethren, be your practice in 
future, when you come together to partake of the Lord's Supper, to wait for one 
another before you enter upon the sacred service. If any one is hungry, let him eat 
to satisfy his appetite in his own house, either before or after this Christian com- 
munion, so that he will not be tempted to withhold his surplus from the common 
stock, and be involved in a common condemnation ; and as to the rest of your 
irregularities " — whether including the use of the common elements of the love-feast, 
instead of the proper and carefully prepared bread and wine of the passover, — 
' those I will set in order on my personal arrival amongst you.' " 

We learn from this passage, — 

I. That the Christians had unwisely mixed up a social meal (yet eaten unsocially 
by not a few) with the proper celebration of the Lord's Supper ; but whether this 
eranos had actually been substituted for a distinct celebration of the Supper, or had 

* That Note is as follows : — "Methttein, from methu (probably derived from the Northern tned 
or metJi) signifies 'to moisten'; methusthai, 'to be moistened with liquor,' and in a figurative 
sense, like the Latin madere vino, 'to be filled with wine.' In classical use it generally, but not 
always,t implies intoxication: in the Hellenistic, however, as Josephus, Philo, and the Lxx., it, 
like the Hebrew shakar in Gen. xliii. 34, seldom denotes more than to drink freely and to hilarity, 
which is, probably, the sense here." 



t Homer, for example, in the Iliad, xvii. 390, says of the hides of oxen, methuousan aloiphee, 
' were soaked in grease.' When Anacreon, in his forty-seventh Ode, says, hopds methudn choerusd, 
he does not mean that he will dance when ' intoxicated,' but when satiated with the cups of wine 
he has ordered to be brought. Hippocrates (De Ratione Victus, lib. iii.) expressly uses the word 
not for excess — 'drink freely {methustkeenai) — but not beyond measure (hyperbolehn).' The 
earliest form of this word meth is to be found in methuer, the ancient Coptic title of the Mother 
Goddess, so named, as Plutarch says (in his ' Isis et Osiris'), "because methu signifies 'full,' and 
er, 'cause,' for matter \sfulloi the (Divine) order {tou kosmoti). 



I CORINTHIANS, XI. 23 — 26. 343 

marred its devout observance by introducing into it a spirit of irreverence and dis- 
content, cannot now be decided. 

2. That this association of common eating and drinking with religious worship 
was disapproved in general by the apostle, on account both of the abuses incident 
to it, and of the want of accordance between it and the design of spiritual com- 
munion — elements of defect not at all to be lessened by the introduction of intoxi- 
cating agents. 

3. That this association was peremptorily forbidden, so that the offices of the 
Lord's day and Lord's house might be suitably discharged, including, as they then 
did, a weekly celebration of the Lord's Supper. 

The Corinthians, we may hope and conclude, rendered obedience to the apostle's 
directions ; but ecclesiastical history makes it evident that the abuses censured in 
this epistle long continued in other places. It became customary, however, to 
celebrate the agapce (love-feasts) after the Lord's Supper, and in course of time they 
became separated from the Lord's day worship altogether. 



Chapter XL Verses 23 — 26. 
23 For I have received of the Lord that which also I delivered unto 
you, That the Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed 
took bread : 24 And when he had given thanks, he brake it, and said, 
Take, eat : this is my body, which is broken for you : this do in 
remembrance of me. 25 After the same manner also he took the cup, 
when he had supped, saying, This cup is the new testament in my 
blood : this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me. 
26 For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do shew 
the Lord's death till he come. 



V. 23. I DELIVERED TO YOU] Paredoka humin. 

In which he was betrayed] Hee paredidoto. This striking difference of 
meaning within one verse in a double use of the same word patadidomi, is a lesson 
to those who insist that a word like yayin or oinos could bear but a single significa- 
tion — ' fermented juice of the grape ' ! It is also useful as showing that too much 
stress is not to be laid on an identity of meaning between peina in ver. 21 and peina 
in ver. 34. Hence the invaluable rule of taking the context into consideration is 
sure to misguide rather than to instruct, if a cast-iron identity of sense between 
similar words (or of the same words in different relations) is obstinately assumed. 

V. 24. Take, eat] Labete, phagete. Absent from all the most ancient MSS. 

V. 25. This cup] Touto to poteerion, * this the cup ' = ' this cup which I now 
give to you.' 

This do ye as often as ye drink it] Touto poieite hosakis an pineete, 'this 
do ye as often as ye may drink it.' Codex A stops at poieite, 'do ye.' Dean Stanley 
remarks, " 'Not only at the original feast, but at all your feasts.' These words 
are emphatically introduced, as the thought conveyed in them is carried on to the 
next verse, in order to indicate the continuance and identity of the original meal 
with its subsequent celebration. ' Not only on that one occasion, but on all public 
occasions.* There may also be the further object of showing that in the original 

* This institution, in feet, is a Divine and human pledge conjointly : when the faithful disciple 
truly observes it, he receives renewals of grace from its Author, to whose service he pledges himself 
afresh ; while, on the human side, he shows forth the great truth of sacrifice to the world. People 
who loosely talk against pledges should ' think upon these things? — Eds. 



344 I CORINTHIANS, XV. 32. 

institution the intention was that they should commemorate the Lord's death, not 
only on stated occasions, but at all their meals, whenever they ate bread and drank 
wine." — (Notes on Ep. Cor., vol. ii. 243.) Yet it seems somewhat strained and 
superfluous to apply the hosakis, 'as often,' to any other occasions than the social 
assemblies, when believers came together to call upon the name of their Lord, and 
celebrate His sacrificial love ; and it is, moreover, not consistent with the Pauline 
distinction of eating at home and eating in the church* If we accept the exegesis 
thrown out by Dean Stanley, but not absolutely approved by him, it would involve 
a distinct recognition of the Saviour's self-sacrifice whenever and wherever bread 
and wine are socially partaken of by believers. It does not, however, appear to 
us that more can be fairly deduced from the recited injunction than the duty of 
using the bread and the cup in devout and grateful remembrance of the Lord ' as 
often ' as they are introduced into the assemblies of His people. 



Chapter XV. Verse 32. 
If after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at Ephesus, 
what advantageth it me, if the dead rise not ? let us eat and drink ; 
for to-morrow we die. 



This sensual sentiment had long passed into a proverb. [See Note on Isa. xxii. 
13.] The classical writers offer illustrations too numerous to quote. Anacreon, 
in his Fourth Ode 'To Himself,' has " Stretched on tender myrtles and upon lotus 
herbage, I wish to drink to my friends. And let Cupid, having bound his vest 
above his neck with papyrus, serve me with sweet drink (methu). For like a 
chariot's wheel life runs, being rolled along; and we, our bones dissolved, shall lie 
reduced to a little dust," etc. So in the Fourteenth Ode, 'On being devoid of 
Envy,' he exclaims, " To-day concerns me ; but who knows to-morrow ? Whilst, 
"therefore, it is fair weather, both drink and throw dice, and pour out libations of 
Bacchus ; lest, if disease should come along, it should say, It is not for thee to 
drink!" The same sentiment is expressed in Odes 24, 25, 35, 39, and 40. 
Herodotus (book ii. chap. 78) says it was customary among the Egyptians of his 
day to produce at all their feasts a wooden effigy of a dead person in a coffin, which 
was shown to all the guests, each of whom was addressed in these words, — ' Look- 
ing upon this, both drink and enjoy thyself; for thou shalt be such as this is when 
thou art dead ! ' 

* While Dean Stanley suggests the common use of the symbols of salvation, a clerical friend of 
the Temperance cause argues, that since grape-juice was consecrated as the symbol of atonement, 
it has become unlawful for common use, as was the blood of animals under the old dispensation. 
But it is obvious (from Gen. ix. 4) that the use of blood was forbidden in ancient times simply 
because of its being the ultimate seat of animal life, a reason not applicable to grape-juice ; also 
that the prohibition extended to the use of blood in the flesh as much as to extracted blood, whereas 
only grape-juice expressed, and not grapes themselves with their contained wine, are supposed to 
be now forbidden. Neither does analogy require that because blood, as a symbol of atonement, 
was forbidden to the Jews, therefore grape-juice, which is simply an emblem of Christ's blood — 
itself the true and specific symbol of His atonement, — should be equally interdicted. Again, the 
eucharistic bread, equally with the wine, is a representation of the mysteries of redemption, and 
should, for the same reason as the fruit of the vine, be excluded as ordinary food. That the 
Saviour's own words do not clearly forbid all common use of 'the fruit of the vine,' and that they 
were not so understood by the eleven, or by St Paul, is manifest from the novelty of the theory, 
and from the absence of any single reference to it in the apostolic epistles. It is evident, on the 
contrary, from the Circular Letter of the Council at Jerusalem, and from numerous passages in 
the Pauline Epistles, that such a construction of our Lord's words never occurred to those to whom the 
Holy Spirit was given, expressly that He should lead them into ' all the truth ' necessary to the 
preaching of the gospel and the observance of its laws. 



I CORINTHIANS, XV. 33, 34. 345 

Chapter XV. Verse 33. 
Be not deceived : evil communications corrupt good manners. 



The words ' evil communications corrupt good manners ' are found in one of 
Menander's dramas, but it may have passed into a proverb in the Apostle's days, 
and have been cited by him as such. The statement itself is confirmed by daily 
experience, and evinces the wisdom of reducing our necessary contact with evil 
within the narrowest possible limits, that the personal and social corruption they 
are calculated to produce may be restrained. That drinking fashions and tippling 
resorts are vehicles of such corruption, in its most contagious and injurious forms, 
cannot be doubted by those who have carefully inquired into their influence on 
domestic and public life. Hence the demand for earnest and persistent effort to 
place the one under the stigma of a moral public opinion, and the other under the 
ban of civil law. 



Chapter XV. Verse 34. 

Awake to righteousness, and sin not; for some have not the 
knowledge of God : I speak this to your shame. 



Awake to righteousness] Ekneepsate, dikaios, 'be sober again, righteously.' 
The present imperative is employed to mark that the change should be immediate. 
Ek, prefixed to neepsate, indicates a return to sobriety, neepsis, from an opposite 
condition. In the Lxx. the phrase is used in the sense of awakening out of a 
drunken sleep,— in reference to Noah, Nabal, and the drunkards of Israel. [See 
Notes on Gen. ix. 24; 1 Sam. xxv. 37; Joel i. 5.] Commentators differ on the 
question whether the word here has a literal or figurative application, — whether the 
apostle calls upon the Corinthians to become literally 'sober,' or whether he com- 
pares their spiritual state to one of intoxicating stupor, and invokes them to shake 
themselves free of it. [As to neepho, see Note on I Thess. v. 7. ] The exact force 
of the adverb dikaios is also disputed. Some take it in the modal sense of 'fully,' 
'perfectly,' ' effectually '= 'become sober again, thoroughly. ' Others prefer the 
moral sense of 'justly' or ' righteously '= 'become sober again, as it is right.' 
Others agree with the A. Vt, in giving to ekneepsate dikaios a causal connection 
and righteous result = 'become sober again, and so enter on a righteous career.' 
Conybeare and Howson, in their ' Life and Letters of St Paul,' paraphrase the 
verse thus : — "Change your drunken revellings into the sobriety of righteousness, 
and live no more in sin." However it may be read, it must be understood as 
antagonistic to every degree of sensualizing influence. 

44 



THE SECOND EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE CORINTHIANS. 



Chapter V. Verse 16. 



Wherefore henceforth know we no man after the flesh : yea, though 
we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we 
him no more. 



By knowing Christ 'after the flesh' {kata sarkos) the apostle alludes to the 
external events of the Saviour's life separated from their spiritual significance. 
With such a knowledge of Christ he declares he would not be satisfied, since it was 
wholly devoid of that transforming and assimilating power which belongs to a 
spiritual discernment of Christ, and that alone. May not this passage be justly 
applied to those who think they find a sanction to their use of intoxicating drinks 
in the example of the Redeemer ? If, as they suppose — and suppose without any 
warrant from the Gospel history, — the Lord made and used inebriating wine, their 
plea is at best grounded in a knowledge of Him after the flesh, — such a knowledge, 
in fact, as they would never dream of putting to a similar use by conforming to His 
style of dress, manner of traveling, and outward life in general. On the contrary, 
to know Him ' after the spirit ' is to understand, appreciate, and imitate Him in 
the spiritual principles by which He was actuated. If we have not His spirit, * we 
are none of His,' and the paramount question for every Christian to consider and 
answer for himself is, whether a resemblance to that spirit, so loving and self- 
denying, is not exhibited in abstinence from alcoholic beverages, rather than in their 
most limited but self-indulgent use ? Beyond all dispute, if abstinence is vastly 
more conducive to the good of society than drinking, a perception of this truth 
will lead those who know ' Christ after the spirit ' to abstain with all readiness and 
cheerfulness. If any man say that he honestly believes drinking to be, on the whole, 
more useful to society and to the cause of religion than abstinence would be, it is 
not for us to judge our brother, but we may affectionately urge him not to rest in 
such a condition without a full, careful, and unbiased examination of all the evidence 
within his reach. 



Chapter VII. Verse i. 

Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse 
ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness 
in the fear of God. 



2 CORINTHIANS, VII. I. 347 

Great was the anxiety of the apostle that his children in Christ should keep 
themselves unspotted from the world, and that they and he should purify themselves 
from "every defilement {pantos molusmou-^-m I Cor. viii. 7 the verb is rendered 
in A. V. 'defiled ') of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness {epitelountes agiosuneen 
— completing the work of holiness in all its parts) in the fear of God." Such a 
desire after exemption from all stain of sin would, if universal and deep-seated, go 
far to secure its own realization, for it would instinctively lead to the avoidance of 
all things that expose the Christian to the dreaded contamination. It is remarkable 
that the defilement is spoken of as pertaining to ' flesh and spirit ' ; and whether 
the allusion is to the flesh and spirit as the sources of the defilement, or as the 
recipients of it, the caution conveyed ought to make believers shun intoxicating 
liquor, because that is adapted, more than any other external agency, to stimulate 
those lusts of the flesh and impurities of the spirit that bring the soul into deadly 
peril. Most true it is, that so long as the Christian is in the world, he will be 
exposed, more or less, to its evil ; but this consideration, instead of diminishing, 
ought to increase his aversion to alcoholic beverages, as a wholly superfluous and 
artificially superinduced element of danger, and (as experience proves) of destruc- 
tion, to innumerable souls. 



THE EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE GALATIANS. 



Chapter V. Verses 13, 14. 

13 For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not 
liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. 
14 For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this ; Thou shalt 
love thy neighbor as thyself. 



Instead of alia dia tees agapees, 'but by love,' Codex D has alia tee agapeetou 
Pneumatos, ' but in (or by) the beloved Spirit. ' And after the words ho gar pas 
nomos, 'for the whole law,' the same Codex reads in humon, 'in you.' 



Christians are called ' unto liberty ' {ep J eleutheria), — liberty from the condemna- 
tion and power of sin, and liberty from the yoke of ceremonial observances ; but 
this liberty is conditioned by the proviso that it is not to be used ' for an occasion 
to the flesh' (eis aphormeen tec sarki). It is a liberty that is to be made no 
excuse for indulging and pampering fleshly appetites ; but using love as its instru- 
mental and efficient power, it is to be exercised and manifested in acts of service 
by Christians to one another. For the whole moral law, as it relates to our human 
duties, is summed up in the precept to love our neighbor as ourself. To what extent, 
even among professing Christians, the use of alcoholic liquors is made an ' occasion 
of the flesh,' we need not conjecture; but it may be affirmed with confidence, that 
a general resolution by Christians to prefer the good of others to the gratification 
of a merely sensuous taste, would result in an avoidance of strong drink more 
extended, a discouragement of drinking customs more effectual, than Christendom 
has ever yet beheld. Those who plead that they ' are at liberty to drink,' cannot 
vindicate such a liberty on any Christian principle till they have shown that it is 
not claimed for mere self-indulgence, and is consistent with the utmost usefulness 
in the sphere assigned them by a gracious Providence. 



Chapter V. Verses 19 — 21. 

19 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; 
Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, 20 Idolatry, witch- 
craft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, 
21 Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like : of the 
which I tell you before, as I have also X.o\&you in time past, that they 
which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. 



GALATIANS, V. 1 9 — 21. 349 

V. 21. Drunkenness] Metkai, 'intemperances ' — copious indulgences in drinks, 
some of which would have the power of inebriating, though intoxication is not the 
essence, but only the extreme of the vice condemned by the apostle. The essential 
of the vice is, that men drink for pleasure, regardless of the law of God or the 
claims of man. 

Revellings] Komoi, ' revelries ' — the acts of disorder and profligacy attendant 
on the metkai previously named. Concerning the corruption of morals engendered 
by this conduct, and the degree in which it abounded, both Pliny and Philo, con- 
temporaries of St Paul, have left pictures of the gross sensuality of that age. 
Pliny writes (book xiv. c. 28), " If any one will take the trouble duly to consider 
the matter, he will find that upon no one operation is the industry of man kept 
more constantly on the alert than upon the making of wine, as if nature had not 
given us water as a beverage, — the one, in fact, of which all other animals make 
use. We, on the other hand, even go so far as to make our very beasts of burden 
drink wine! — so vast are our efforts, so vast our labors, and so boundless the 
cost which we thus lavish upon a liquid which deprives man of his reason, and 
drives him to frenzy and to the commission of a thousand crimes. So great, how- 
ever, are its attractions, that a great part of mankind are of opinion that there is 
nothing else in life worth living for. Nay, what is even more than this, that we 
may be enabled to swallow all the more, we have adopted the plan of diminishing 
its strength by pressing it through filters of cloth, and have devised numerous 
inventions whereby to create an artificial thirst. To promote drinking we find 
that even poisonous mixtures have been invented, and some even are known to 
take a dose of hemlock before they begin to drink, that they may have the fear of 
death before them to make them take their wine.* Others, again, take powdered 
pumice for the same purpose ; and various other mixtures, which I should feel 
quite ashamed any further to enlarge upon. We see the more prudent among 
those who are given to this habit, have themselves parboiled in hot baths, from 
whence they are carried away half dead. Others, again, cannot wait till they have 
got to the banqueting couch — no, not so much as till they have got their shirt on, 
— but, all naked and panting as they are, the instant they leave the bath they seize 
hold of large vessels filled with wine, to show off, as it were, their mighty powers, 
and so gulp down the whole of the contents, only to vomit them up again the very 
next moment. This they will repeat, too, a second and even a third time. And 
then, too, what vessels are employed for holding wine ! — carved all over with the 
representations of adulterous intrigues, as if, in fact, drunkenness itself was not 
sufficiently capable of teaching us lessons of lustfulness." 

Philo, in his treatise on 'Drunkenness,' refers to " the contrivances displayed in 
the preparation of different kinds of wine to produce some the effects of which 
shall speedily go off, and which shall not produce headache ; but, on the contrary, 
shall be devoid of any tendency to heat the blood, and shall be very fragrant, 
admitting either a copious or a scanty admixture with water, according as the 
object is to have a strong and powerful draught or a gentle and imperceptible 
one." And describing those who are 'insatiably fond of wine,' he states, "After 
they have drunk they are still thirsty, and they begin drinking at first out of small 
cups ; then, as they proceed, they tell their servants to bring them wine in larger 
goblets ; and when they are pretty full and getting riotous, being no longer able to 
restrain themselves, they take bowls and goblets of all the largest sizes that they 
can get, and drink the wine unmixed in huge draughts, until they are either over- 

* Wine was believed to be the only antidote to the poison of hemlock. 



350 GALATIANS, VI. 7, 8. 

come by deep sleep, or till what they have poured into themselves is vomited out 
again through repletion."* 

It may not be easy to decide whether the apostle had any motive in bringing up 
the rear of all the sins enumerated with ' drunkenness ' and ' revellings ' ; but it is 
incontrovertible that to them may be traced, as to a fountain, many of the other 
evils, or at least their prevalence. Very solemn is the declaration that, equally 
with these transgressions and crimes, will drunkenness and revelling exclude their 
subjects from the kingdom of God. How can it be otherwise? — for what more 
than they grieves the Holy Spirit, and effectually excludes the possible existence 
of that state of mind and heart which can alone render heaven a place of enjoy- 
ment to the human soul ? 



Chapter V. Verses 22 — 24. 
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentle- 
ness, goodness, faith, 23 Meekness, temperance : against such there is 
no law. 24 And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with 
the affections and lusts. 



V. 23. Temperance] Enkrateia, 'self-restraint.' Conybeare and Howson 
render by 'self-denial.' This fruit of the Spirit — the one last named— stands in 
opposition to the associated vices named in ver. 21. [See Note on Acts xxiv. 25.] 
Against such virtues and graces there is no law, for they are the evidences of that 
spiritual decalogue which Christ writes upon all hearts that He makes His own. 
Those who are Christ's — who belong to Him by a regenerating influence — ' have 
crucified the flesh with its affections and lusts ' ; they no longer do what is pleasing 
to the flesh because it is so, but what is pleasing to Christ, who loved them and 
gave Himself for them. 



Chapter VI. Verses 7, 8. 
7 Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man 
soweth, that shall he also reap. 8 For he that soweth to his flesh 
shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit 
»shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. 



As the seed, so the produce ; as the sowing, so the reaping. The correspondence 
is invariably preserved. So in the fable, when dragon's teeth were sown, armed 
men sprang up. As true Science, therefore, consists in tracing effects to their 
causes, so true Wisdom lies in avoiding the causes of evil, and seeking to substitute 
the causes of happiness and goodness. To foster the causes and expect different 
consequences is the extreme of irrationality, and must bring with it perpetual dis- 
appointment. Of such unreason, however, the world is guilty when it clings to 
strong drink and drinking fashions, and all the while hopes and expects that 
intemperance will cease ! On a visitation of cholera or typhus to a locality, the 
development of the seeds of the pestilence in any particular individual cannot be 
predicted, but there can be little uncertainty as to the fact that it will be developed 
amongst some persons most recipient of its influence. So the connection of drinking 

* Hence the need of warning, in that day, against being ' given to much wine ' — whether inebriat- 
ing, or not. 



GALATIANS, VI. 9, 10. 35 1 

with drunkenness cannot be asserted of any particular person who begins to drink, 
but may be positively affirmed of some in any moderate aggregation of such 
beginners. The legitimate conclusion is — the rejection of strong drink, not the 
fatalistic, pseudo-philosophical dogma that drunkenness must necessarily exist. If 
a nation will create and cultivate a taste for alcoholic liquors — will foster it by 
fashion and feed it by license, — the curse of intemperance must surely visit it, 
whatever is then done to avert it. The nexus cannot be broken, but the artificial 
appetite and habit may. 



Chapter VI. Verse 9. 
And let us not be weary in well doing : for in due season we shall 
reap, if we faint not. 



Well-doing is sowing good seed ; such seed will spring up. The sower, if he 
do not faint, will reap the fruit; therefore let him not be weary in 'well doing.' 
'Whatsoever ye sow, of that,' not of some other kind ',' 'ye will reap.' Good as 
certainly results from good as evil from evil. Convinced that we have what is 
good, let us then plentifully sow it, in confidence of a fruitful harvest in reserve. 
This promise will, as a rule, be fulfilled in a measure even upon earth ; and what 
this world does not yield, 'the world to come' will unfailingly supplement and 
supply. The well-doing spoken of is not restricted to direct Christian teaching, 
and the Temperance Reform has produced some of the most striking illustrations 
of this great providential law which modern times have witnessed. Let all who 
desire the weal of humanity engage in this sphere of well-doing, and the land will 
be covered with the precious harvest of their labors. 



Chapter VI. Verse 10. 
As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, 
especially unto them who are of the household of faith. 



Opportunity] ICairon, 'season.' This is the condition of active usefulness. 
'Let us do good,' ergazometha to agathon, 'let us work what is good' to all, 
primarily to those who are of the household of the faith. No principle of benevo- 
lent action can be wider than this — every opportunity, every kind of good, every 
class of person. If, therefore, abstinence affords an opportunity of service to our 
fellow-creatures, it is a means of ' working good,' not to be despised or neglected 
without a clear violation of this law of Christian conduct. To say, ' I don't believe 
abstinence would supply such a means of good,' is no justification of indifference 
unless we have first given it a fair and careful trial. 



THE EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE EPHESIANS. 



Chapter V. Verse 18. 



And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess ; but be filled with 
the Spirti. 

And be not drunk with wine] Kai mee methuskesthe oino, 'and be not 
surcharged with wine.' Drinking immense quantities of wine was common among 
the Greeks, and (strange as it may appear to modern bibbers) the intoxicating 
liquors used were largely diluted, with the express intention of making the potations 
both deep and prolonged. Public sentiment in Athens, in the time of Plato, did 
not go beyond condemning drunkenness — and not always that, for at the festivals 
of Dionysius (Bacchus) 'the giver of wine,' an abnegation of sobriety was almost 
universal ! 

In which] En ho, 'in which.' The subject of this 'which' may be the 
previous word 'wine,' or the whole of the preceding clause; that is, it may signify 
'in which wine,' or 'in which state of vinous intemperance.' Bengel's note is 
emphatic, — En ho, in quo vino scilicet quatenus immoderate hauritur, ' in which 
wine, evidently, since it is immoderately swallowed.' Doddridge takes the same 
view, and regards this construction as a beautiful figure. Having before him the 
Lxx. rendering of Prov. xx. I — akolaston oinos, 'wine is an incorrigible thing,' — : 
the apostle might readily affirm that ' in ' wine, estin asotia, ' there is unsavableness.' 
Nor would such an affirmation be purely figurative, seeing that the alcoholic 
element is the active producer of that appetite and that sensuality which plunge 
multitudes into perdition. 

Is excess] Estin asotia, 'is unsavableness ' = utter depravity and dissoluteness. 
The word asotia is compounded of a and sotia, and literally signifies the absence of 
salvation — a state of hopeless moral disintegration and ruin. Clement of Alex- 
andria, in his ' Psedagogue,' b. ii., says: — "I admire those who desire no other 
beverage than water, the medicine of a wise temperance, avoiding wine as they 
would fire. It is desirable young men and maidens should forego this medicament 
altogether, for . . . hence arise irregular desires and licentious conduct ; . . . the 
whole body is excited before its time by the action of wine on the system. The body 
inflames the soul. . . . Well, then, has the apostle said, ' Be not surcharged with 
wine, in which is asotia, a shameful licentiousness.'' He seems to signify the impos- 
sibility of salvation (soteeria) to drunkards, for the word asoteia, in Greek, means 
equally ' luxury,' and an incapacity for salvation." — (A. D. 200. ) Similarly the French 
word roue, ' one broken on the wheel,' is also applied to an utter profligate. 

The rendering ' excess ' is very tame ; and, being a mere repetition of the idea 



EPHESIANS, V. 1 8. 353 



contained in ' drunk,' is a platitude unworthy of inspiration. More to the point is 
Wiclif 's version, 'And nyle ye be drunken of wyne, in whiche is leecherie.' 
The Rheims V. has 'wherein is riotousnes.' The Vulgate has luxuria, 
'luxuriousness,' akin to the word which it supplies in Prov. xx. I, — luxuriosa 
res vinum est. Beza has luxus, ' wantonness ' or ' extravagance. ' Calvin says, 
In quo nomine intelligo lascivias omne genus et dissolutiones, ' by which term I 
understand all kind of impurities and dissipations.' The epithet as an adverb 
occurs in the parable of the prodigal son (Luke xv. 13), where the words ren- 
dered in A. V. ' in riotous living ' are zon asdtos, ' living ruinously. ' 

But BE FILLED WITH THE Spirit] Alia pleerousthe en Pneumati, 'but be ye 
filled in spirit,' or 'with the Spirit.' Either "be not filled-full of wine as to your 
body, as the heathen are, but be ye filled in your spirit with all holy influences " ; 
or, "let your fulness be not that of wine, but of the Spirit which you have 
received by faith in Christ." The first interpretation is favored by the absence of 
the article to (the) before Pneumati (Spirit), but the other is generally adopted, and 
the signification is not different ; for if, as all commentators agree, the mee methus- 
kesthe of the first clause is in apposition with the pleerousthe of the second, the oinos 
of the one requires an expressed or implied agent to correspond, which can be no 
other than the Holy Spirit, given to those that believe. Dr Eadie, in his Com- 
mentary, rejects the opinion that the apostle alludes, as in I Cor. xi., to any abuse 
of the old love-feasts, or of the Lord's Supper; and he contrasts the vain attempt 
of men of the world to keep full of the wine whose fumes and stimulation are 
evanescent, with the Christian's full possession by the influences of the Spirit, 
which 'are not only powerful, but replete with satisfaction to the heart of man.' 
Conybeare and Howson give the following as the sense of the whole passage : 
"When you meet, let your enjoyment consist not in fulness of wine, but fulness of 
the Spirit; let your songs be not the drinking-songs of heathen feasts, but psalms 
and hymns ; and their accompaniment not the music of the lyre, but the melody 
of the heart ; while you sing them to the praise, not of Bacchus or Venus, but of 
the Lord Jesus Christ." 

Obs. 1. The apostle's Divine philosophy at once goes to causes. He presents in 
this verse a practical antithesis between fulness of wine and fulness of the Divine 
Spirit; not an antithesis between one state of fulness and another — mere effects, — 
but an antithesis pointing to an intrinsic contrariety of nature and operation 
between the sources of such fulness — viz., inebriating wine and the Holy Spirit. 
This contrast will be better understood by quoting the preceding words, ' Where- 
fore be ye not unwise ' (aphrones, without reason) = not forgetting how antagonistic 
to the full possession and exercise of your mind the use of wine comes to be, taken 
in quantities that some may not call excessive. 

2. Whether the asotia, 'dissoluteness,' be referred to wine as its germinal and 
active principle, or to ' drunkenness ' as the state of body and mind which brings 
the profligacy into play, the fact of connection is affirmed, and is to be solemnly 
taken into account in all Christian enterprises and efforts of reformation. When 
intoxicating liquor exerts its specific effects it places the subject in astoia, which is 
not merely a state in which he cannot be saved, but is synonymous with a condition 
of moral corruption quite inimical to the reception of saving truth. Alcohol 
deranges the functions of the brain — the medium of mental action, — and tends to 
bring about organic disease, so that its influence on mind and morals is entirely 
different in character from the influence of such evil inclinations and habits as leave 
the brain in healthy rapport with the intellectual powers. Hence the renunciation 
45 



354 EPHESIANS, V. 1 8. 



of inebriating drinks is generally a pre-requisite for the acceptance of the Holy 
Spirit, and has been found a positive and direct means of preparation for spiritual 
impressions by thousands of once prodigal drunkards. 

3. The objection, that since the apostle says, 'Be not drunk with wine,' he 
virtually sanctions a use of wine short of drunkenness, is one of those superficial 
inferences in which uneducated or prejudiced minds delight. It is surely possible 
in our day for a Christian missionary to condemn and forbid intemperance by 
opium, without approving of the use of that drug in any degree. If the words 
'in which is dissoluteness ' are joined to the word 'wine,' a powerful warning is 
given in respect to wine itself; and however the clauses may be construed, the 
passage in its entirety neither recommends intoxicating drink nor implies that its 
use, in the smallest measure, is either salutary or safe. The soul ' filled with the 
Spirit ' is not supposed to crave after strong drink, but is more likely to resemble 
the wise man of whom Philo (Paul's contemporary) observes, that 'he will never 
voluntarily make use of unmixed wine, or of any drug of folly ' (akraton kai pan 
aphrosunees pharmakon hekon oupote). Expositors, not themselves abstainers, 
illustrate this text by a reference to Luke i. 14, where the promise that John 
should be 'filled with the Holy Spirit,' even from his birth, was connected with 
the heavenly prohibition, 'wine and strong drink he shall not drink.' Thus 
Olshausen, in his comment on this verse, writes, "Man feels the want of a 
strengthening through spiritual influences from without; instead of seeking for 
these in the Holy Spirit, he in his blindness has recourse to the 'natural' spirit, 
that is, to wine and strong drinks. Therefore, according to the point of view of 
the Law, the Old Testament recommends abstinence from wine and strong drinks, 
in order to preserve the soul free from all merely natural influences, and by that 
means to make it more susceptible of the operations of the Holy Spirit." 



THE EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE PHILIPPIANS. 



Chapter IV. Verse 5. 
Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at 
hand. 



Moderation] Epieikees, 'seemliness,' or 'gentleness.' The Vulgate has 
modestia, which the Rheims version converts into 'modestie.' Wiclif gives 'be 
youre pacience known to alle men ' ; Tyndale and Cranmer, ' softness ' ; the Geneva 
V. 'patient mynde.' Had the A. V. read 'moderation-of-mind,' the ignorant 
perversion of this text into an objection to the Temperance movement — as if the 
apostle were recommending ' moderation-in -liquors ' — would have been avoided. 
The reference is either to that propriety and consistency of conduct which 
Christians should ever exhibit, or to that gentleness and equanimity of soul 
which should ever be manifested to all, even to persecutors; for 'the Lord is 
at hand,' — at hand to reward His people and judge their oppressors. So far as 
this text can have any bearing on the use of strong drinks, it would be impossible 
to show that Christian moderation of disposition — whether decorum or serenity — 
is ever increased by the use of the smallest quantity of the wine which is a mocker ; 
while there is lamentable evidence of breaches of propriety and good temper 
provoked by its influence on professing Christians of every name. Cowper, who 
was a good Greek scholar, very well rebukes the prevalent perversion of this text 
in favor of sensuality : — 

' The selfsame word that bids our lusts obey, 
Is misapplied to sanctify their sway.' 



Chapter IV. Verse 8. 



Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things 
are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, 
whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report ; 
if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these 
things. 

This comprehensive principle is an answer to the objection that abstinence is 
not commanded in the Scriptures ; since, if it be included under any of the ' what- 
soever ' of this verse, it is as really affirmed and stamped with apostolic authority 
as if distinctly* pointed out. Nowhere do the sacred writers profess to give an 
exhaustive enumeration of all varieties of virtuous conduct. In the application of 



356 PHILIPPIANS, IV. 8. 



this catholic course of Christian morals, all that is necessary is to ascertain whether 
any particular act or line of conduct comes under the rule laid down ; if it does, the 
scriptural application of it comes out as clearly and conclusively as, in logic, the 
conclusion of a properly constructed syllogism issues from its premises. This 
apostolic description aptly and singularly unites the two elements contained respec- 
tively in the definition of morality given by Socrates and Plato. The former 
defines virtue as that which is done with ' perception ' — i. e. of truth and suitability ; 
the latter, as an action in resistance of appetite, manifesting moral strength, or the 
control of the fleshly by the spiritual nature.* "The Christian has had to deal with 
a thousand things against which no Divine [verbal] intimation could have been 
quoted, but the evil of which conscience [enlightened by fact] would have taught 
him. Men practically ignore their conscience in this matter." — (A. Purey-Cust, 
M. A.) 

* The ancients laid due stress upon knowledge, and ascribed nearly all evil to ignorance. In the 
Neo-platonic book ascribed to Hermes (of which Arabic and Greek copies exist), there occurs the 
following curious passage : — 

" Whither are you carried, O men, drunken with drinkitig up the unmixed wine {akraton) of 
Ignorance ? which seeing you cannot bear, why do you not (as with wine) vomit it up again ? 

"Stand, drink not {neepsa?ites), and look up with the eyes of your heart. 

" For the malice of Ignorance overrunneth the Earth, and corrupteth the Soul. Seek where the 
clear light is, that is pure from darkness, where not one is drunken (methuei), but all are abstinent, 
sober " {neephousin). — The Pcemander, lib. vii. 



THE EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO THE COLOSSIANS. 



Chapter II. Verse 16. 

Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect 
of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days. 



Or in drink] Ee en posei, 'or in drink.' Codex B has kai en posei, 'and in 
drink. » 



The apostle is not alluding to a distinction of drinks as intrinsically wholesome 
or unwholesome, dangerous or safe, but to certain arbitrary and ceremonial fancies 
founded on Jewish ideas of 'clean ' and 'unclean.' Some expositors suppose the 
existence at Colosse of a strong pseudo-ascetic party, such as afterward developed 
into the Gnostic sect, which affirmed that hulee, 'matter,' was 'inherently evil' ; 
and if this conjecture be correct, the caution of St Paul is intelligible, and in perfect 
harmony with the Temperance doctrine that whatever God provides for the food 
of man is 'very good.' The text, observe, has a dual reading, — for if I am not to 
judge my neighbor in eating or drinking, neither must my neighbor judge me in 
abstaining from meat or drink. If people would first consider what this text does 
not mean, they would more accurately comprehend what is its true scope and 
purport. For instance, it cannot be supposed that it forbids that exercise of 
reason concerning the quality and consequences of action which the apostle himself 
is enforcing. He is bringing a certain wilful self-regarding conduct before the 
church for judgment. He cannot, then, mean that the Christian is not to judge in 
such matters, for he is himself judging, and has elsewhere, on this very case, come 
to a conclusion which he puts as an interrogatory — ' How then walk you charitably, 
if you do these things ? ' Still less can the apostle be understood to affirm that we 
are to exercise no discrimination as to the qualities of food or drink, for that would 
be equal to saying that the laws of physiology are abolished to the Christian ! Nor 
can ' the liberty ' so often pleaded for be sustained by this text as being ' the power 
to act, or not to act, according to one's own pleasure.' True 'liberty' — Christian 
'liberty' — has no such test as 'pleasure' or wilfulness. It must be based upon 
'the ought,'' and be guided by the reasonable and the imperative — the imperative 
because the reasonable. The will must be the servant of the reason, not the slave 
of the passions. In a Christian sense, we are only 'free to act rightly,' or, as it is 
poetically and proverbially expressed, — 

' He is the freeman whom the Truth makes free.' 



358 COLOSSIANS, II. 20 — 22. 

Obey conscience first, for it is God's proximate organ of truth; but, beyond and 
above all, seek the truth which gives authority to conscience and direction to the 
will. " Looking upon my neighbor's conviction, I say, If you esteem such a course 
best (not pleasantest) and right (not comfortable merely), you will do well to pursue 
it; but as for me, the truth seems the highest obligation, and therefore I follow 
it, whether it be pleasant or painful." 



Chapter II. Verse 20 — 22. 



20 Wherefore if ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of the 
world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances, 
21 (Touch not ; taste not ; handle not ; 22 Which all are to perish with 
the using;) after the commandments and doctrines of men? 



This passage has been foolishly quoted as condemnatory of the Temperance 
reform, as thus: — "The language of ver. 22 is at times applied to strong drink; 
but St Paul quotes it to condemn it ; ergo he condemns the modern application " ! 
Can anything be more puerile ? By parity of zmreason, if the words were applied 
to the common use of laudanum, St Paul would become, logically, ranged on the 
side of the opium-eater ! 

It is said that Temperance advocates, like the persons censured by St Paul, 
insist upon self-mortification and compliance with absurd ordinances of restraint ; 
but,— 

(1) No one can be more emphatic himself than St Paul (i Cor. ix.) in exhort- 
ing Christians to self-mastery and subjugation of mere animal desire ; and no one 
dealt more copiously than he in the spirit and language of prohibition ; does he 
therefore come under his own rebuke ? 

(2) It is altogether contrary to truth to affirm that the abstinence principle is 
based on the theory of neglecting or emaciating the body ; the opposite is the fact ; 
abstinence is expressly founded on the injurious nature of alcohol. 

Correctly construed, the passage is favorable to the Temperance reform, for 
the apostle repudiates ordinances springing from the theory of a moral or immoral 
quality in things themselves, irrespective of their actual effects, — putting super- 
stitious fancies in the place of observed results ; whereas the Temperance principle 
ascribes Tightness and wrongness solely to responsible agents, and proscribes 
intoxicating drinks as unfit for use on the ground of a want of physical appro- 
priateness, and their injurious influences upon the body, and only through it upon 
the mental and moral nature. Hence the apostle's argument is, that as material 
things are perishable, to identify religion with material observances is to degrade 
it, with all its immortal treasures ; — an excellent reason, so far as it goes, against 
that blind attachment to intoxicating liquors which is the only religion that many 
persons acknowledge, while over many men, who profess better things, these 
drinks exert a witchery that Christianity fails to command. Truly, 'extremes 
meet'; and the superstitious rejection of good or neutral things is well matched 
by the senseless and sensual esteem in which bad and dangerous things are 
held. 



colossians. 359 



Chapter II. Verse 23. 
Which things have indeed a show of wisdom. 



This text has sometimes been oddly quoted against the practice of abstinence 
from alcoholic liquors, to which it has no relation whatever. An enlightened 
Temperance man does not abstain from wine, 'the mocker,' because he believes it 
is a good creature, which will strenghten the body, but because he knows it is a 
bad article, that will weaken and deprave it. It is a physiological truth, that to 
weaken the body is to weaken the brain, the organ of the mind, and thereby to 
increase the power of many morbid and depraved feelings. On the other hand, 
to keep the body pure, as commanded in the sequel (chap. iii. 4, 5), is the rational 
method of aiding the suppression of ' shameful appetites and unnatural desires.' 
Hence the propriety of not looking, with desire, upon ' the wine which is red,' 
'lest thine eyes look upon strange women, and thine heart dictate perverse 
things.' 

Christianity, far from discarding either the wisdom of the past, or the science of 
the present, should collect and concentrate around its own lofty principles of action 
the light of all ages, to induce at once a broader and a truer mode of individual and 
social life. Hence alone can the Christian be ' thoroughly furnished unto all good 
works.' 



THE FIRST EPISTLE OF ST PAUL 

TO THE THESSALONIANS. 



Chapter V. Verse 6 — 9. 

6 Therefore let us not sleep, as do others ; but let us watch and be 
sober. 7 For they that sleep, sleep in the night ; and they that be 
drunken are drunken in the night. 8 But let us, who are of the day, 
be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love ; and for an 
helmet, the hope of salvation. 9 For God hath not appointed us to 
wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ. 



V. 6. Let us watch] Greegoromen, ' let us be wakeful ' ; in apposition to the 
'let us not sleep ' of the preceding clause. 

And be sober] Kai neephomen, 'let us be abstinent.' 

V. 7. And they that be drunken are drunken in the night] Kai 
oi methuskomenoi nuktos methuousin, 'and those that are making themselves 
drunk, drink deep in the night.' A partial reform had been effected since the 
days of Isaiah, when men rose up early in the morning to follow strong drink. 

V. 8. But let us, who are of the day, be sober] Heemeis de heemeras 
ontes neephomen, ' but let us who are of the day be abstinent. ' 



Day and night, light and darkness, have been immemorial symbols of truth and 
error, holiness and sin. In speaking of the coming of ' the day of Christ ' — the 
day of revelation and destiny — the apostle reminds the Thessalonians (ver. 4) that 
they were not ' in darkness ' — in a state of depravity, — so that that day should 
overtake them ' as a thief.' [Some MSS. read hos kleptas, 'as thieves,' instead of 
hos kleptees, ' as a thief. ' ] As children of the day, then, it was fitting that they 
should not sleep, as others did, wh» were children of the night — i. e. that they 
should not be in a state of insensibility and moral unpreparedness for the advent of 
the ' great day of the Lord ' ; rather that they should be ever ' wakeful ' and ' sober,' 
free from all intoxicating influences and delusions. The use of the word neephomen 
seems to have suggested to St Paul another descriptive metaphor — that of drinkers 
carousing, which in his age was wholly carried on in the night season, except by 
the outrageously intemperate. As those who sleep are insensible of what is passing 
and impending, so sinners are insensible of approaching judgment — this is one 
comparison. But also, as lovers of strong drink fill themselves in the night, so do 
sinners fill and intoxicate themselves with delusive pleasures — those of drink among 



CRITICAL REMARKS ON ' NEEPHO,' ETC. 36 1 

the rest, — in contrast to whom the Christian, 'who is of the day,' is both wake- 
ful and abstinent, even as those who in the day time go about their business and 
keep themselves free from inebriating drinks in order that they may be able to 
discharge their duties aright. That the apostle wishes neephomen to be taken 
literally as well as spiritually may be inferred from the well-known connection of 
sobriety with wakefulness, both of the senses and of the mind ; as if he had said, 
'The children of the day are to be wakeful; and in order that they may be 
wakeful, let them also be sober.' The influence of even small portions of alcoholic 
liquor in producing drowsiness is well known, and not a few persons who do not 
always abstain, yet abstain during the day in order that they may be the better 
qualified for the business of life. The military metaphor which the apostle pro- 
ceeds to introduce — ' putting on the breastplate of righteousness ' — supports the 
view that he uses neepho in its primary sense, for the Roman soldier on duty was 
bound over to the most stringent sobriety, and no other drink but posca, an 
acidulous liquor, was supplied to him. Xenophon, in his Cyropcedia (vii. 5), 
represents Cyrus the Great as addressing his chiefs, and reminding them that their 
soldiers were all wakeful and sober {egreegoratas apantas kai neephontas~), while 
many of the Babylonians were asleep, and many of them drunken (methuousi). 
Plutarch says of Epaminondas, that on one occasion ' he went the round of the 
defences and walls, telling the men not to sleep nor to drink {agrupnein kai 
neephein), so that the others might have license to sleep and to sot {methuein).' 
To the Christian soldier, physical sobriety is as needful as to the literal warrior 
when on service, nor can he wisely dispense with the one infallible security of that 
state — abstinence from all that can intoxicate. 



Critical Remarks on 'Neepho,' etc. 

I. Since this Greek word and its derivatives henceforth occur repeatedly in the 
Apostolic epistles, we will here cite the whole of the eleven passages, with the 
renderings of the A. V. , and then proceed to consider their meaning. 

I Cor. xv. 34. Ekneepsate dikaids, i awake to righteousness.' 

I Thess. v. 6. Greegoromen, 'let us watch,' kai neephomen, 'and be sober.' 

I Thess. v. 8. Heemeis neephomen, ' let us be sober. ' 

1 Tim. hi. 2. (Of a bishop,) let him be neephaleon, 'vigilant,' sophrona, 'sober.' 

1 Tim. hi. n. (Of deacons' wives,) let them be neephaleous, 'sober.' 

2 Tim. ii. 26. Ananeepsosin, 'they may recover themselves.' 

2 Tim. iv. 5. Su de neephe, 'but watch thou,' in pasi, 'in all things.' 

Titus ii. 2. (Of aged men,) neephalious, ' sober. .' 

I Pet. 1. 13. Neephontes, 'he sober.' 

I Pet. iv. 7. Sophroneesate oun, 'be ye therefore sober,' kai neepsate, 'and 
watch,' eis tas pros euc has, 'unto prayers.' 

I Fet. v. 8. Neepsate, 'be sober,' greegoreesate, 'be vigilant.' 

In the Lxx. version of the Old Testament neither the verb neepho nor the 
adjective neephalios occurs, except in combination in the following places : — 

Gen. ix. 24. And Noah exeneepse, ' became sober ' = awoke, apo tou oinou 
(autoii), ' from his wine. ' 

I Sam. xxv. 37. Nabal exeneepsen, 'became sober '= awoke, apo tou oinou, 
'from the wine.' The Hebrew reads, 'in the going out of the wine from Nabal.' 

Joel i. 5. Ekneepsate, ' become sober '= awake. 

Hab. ii. 1. Ekneepson, 'awake!' Hab. ii. 7. Ekneepsousin, ' shall awake. ' 

Ekneepsin occurs in Lament, ii. 8 and (in some MSS.) in hi. 48. 
46 



362 CRITICAL REMARKS ON ' NEEPHO,' ETC. 

In Homer, neither neepho nor any of its derivatives or combinations occur, to our 
knowledge. 

2. That the original signification of neepho implies abstinence from intoxicating 
liquors, maybe safely inferred (1) from its etymon, or derivation, and from the 
definitions of lexicographers ; (2) from its use by ancient authors ; (3) from its use 
in connection with ana and ek, to denote the entire cessation of the vinous influence, 
and the restoration of the body to its normal and naturally abstinent condition ; 
(4) from its figurative employment to denote perfect and natural watchfulness of 
mind, only possible when one abstains from narcotics. 

(1) No derivation of neepho is given in the great works of Pollux, Suidas, 
Scapula, Stephanus, or in several of the principal modern lexicons. But Apollonius 
and Hesychius refer it to neipho = nipho, 'to snow,' which would give neepho 
the sense of 'to be cold,' i.e. exempt from the heating or exciting'influence of wine. 
Scheidius refers it to a supposed nubo, ' to cover ' = numpho ; whence numphee, 
*a veiled maiden,' or a protected woman =a bride. Springing from such a root, 
neepho would imply ' to protect one's self from danger by avoiding the intoxicating 
cup. Schleusner, however, who is followed by some other lexicographers, derives 
it from nee, 'not,' and pino (=pio or pod), 'to drink'; a derivation far preferable 
to those above named. F. Valpy, M. A., Cantab., has suggested another deriva- 
tion, which comes to the same sense : — " Possibly from nee and heepha (perfect of 
apto, * to set on fire ' ), 'not to inflame.'" — ('Fundamental Words of the Greek 
Language,' 1826.) Passing from derivation to definition, Pollux, in his 'Ono- 
masticon,' vi. 26, has, " For they say that neephaliuein is to sacrifice neephalia, 
which is to offer wineless sacrifices (thusiais aoinois) ; those of a different kind 
being described as oinospondous (connected with libations of wine)." Hesychius 
defines neephalioi as neephontes, mee pepokotes, ' those who abstain, who have not 
been drinking.' He defines neephalismenon as hudati ouk oino heegnismenon, 
'consecrated with water, and not with wine.' 

Suidas describes neephalio thusiai as ' sacrifices in which wine is not presented, 
but water mixed with honey.' In Stephanus's Thesaurus the neephalios is said to 
be ho apechon oinon, ' he who abstains from wine ' ; and neephalia xula are ' pieces 
of wood which were burnt in wineless sacrifices.' Schleusner thus defines neepho: — 
Sobrius sum, abstineo ab o?nni ant immoderato vini et omnis potus inebriantis usu, 
' I am sober, I abstain from all, or from an immoderate use of, wine and every 
inebriating drink. ' Excluding the words aut immoderato, this definition would form 
a very appropriate Temperance declaration. Schrevelius (Dr Major's ed., 1844) 
gives neepso, 'to be sober, abstain, be vigilant.' Bretschneider defines neepho, 
' sobrius sum, vino abstineo' (I am sober, I abstain from wine); and neephalios 
' sobrius, vino abstinens : (sober, abstaining from wine). In the Greek Dictionary of 
Byzantius, published at Athens in 1839, neephalios is defined ho mee pinon oinon, 
enkratees, ' one who does not drink wine, an encratite. Neephalia is defined as 
'sacrificial oblations without wine.' And in the Greek- French Lexicon of the 
same author, neephaliotees is explained by abstinence de vin, sobriete, ' abstinence 
from wine, sobriety.' Liddell and Scott's Lexicon defines neepho, ' to be sober, 
to live soberly, especially to drink no wine'' ; Maltby's, 'sobrius sum, to abstain 
from wine ' ; Dunbar's, ' to abstain from wine ' ; Donnegan's, 'to live abstemiously, 
to abstain from wine'; Robinson's New Testament Lexicon, 'to be sober, tem- 
perate, abstinent, especially in respect to wine.' Under 'abstemius,' Younge's 
English and Greek Lexicon gives ' neephon, without wine, aoinos, neephalios ' / 
and under 'without wine,' both aoinos (wine-less) and neephalios are given as 
equivalents. 



CRITICAL REMARKS ON ' NEEPHO,' ETC. 363 

(2) The reader will now be prepared for illustrative citations from Greek and 
Jewish writers. ^Eschylus, in his 'Eumenides,' v. 108, refers to choas S aoinous, 
neephalia meiligmata, * wineless oblations, abstemious gratifications.' Paley, in his 
Notes on ^schylus, remarks, * The reason, probably, was that wine infuriates, and 
leads to the commission of those very crimes which arouse the dread goddesses.' 
Sophocles, in his 'GEdipus at Colonos ' (v. 101), describes CEdipus as stating to 
the Eumenides that he had come to them neephon, aoinois, ' I abstemious, to you 
wineless,' where the force of neephon cannot be mistaken. And because their 
sacrifices must be neephalioi, the chorus informs him that he must propitiate those 
awful powers by oblations of honey and water; adding (v. 481), mee de prospherein 
metfiu, 'be sure not to offer to them inebriating drink.' Aristophanes (Lysist. 
line 1228) introduces an Athenian lover of drink as saying, ' When we (Athenians) 
drink not {neephontes), we are not in a healthy state,' *. e. are good for nothing; a 
character and sentiment which have their parallels in many modern tap-rooms. 
Herodotus (book i. s. 133) states concerning the Persians, that they review, when 
free from drink {neephousi), what they have decided when in liquor ; and, similarly, 
that what they have decided when not drinking (neephontes), they review when in 
their cups. 

Plato, in his 'Philebus' (61), has the following striking passage: — "And now 
to us, as it were to butlers, stand two founts ; the one of pleasure, and a person 
might guess it to be of honey ; but that of the intellect, hard and healthful, he might 
guess to be sober and wineless {neephontikeen kai aoinon)." In his ' Laws ' (b. vi. 
733) he remarks, " It is easy to understand that a city ought not to be mixed like 
a cup in which the maddened wine {mainomenos oinos) effervesces when poured 
forth; but like one that, being subject to the abstemious other deity {hupo tou 
neephontos heterou theou), produces a good and moderate drink, after a beautiful 
commingling." He here represents Bacchus as combined with another deity, 
which he calls neephon theos, an abstemious god ; and Longinus remarks that this 
'other deity' is nothing else than Water, which it was the custom to mix with 
wine. In his ' Banquet,' Plato represents Alcibiades as reproaching the guests, 
"You seem to me to be not-drinking (neephein =to be teetotalizing) : this must 
not be allowed; but you must drink, for so you have agreed, and I will elect 
myself the chairman of the banquet until you have drunk enough." In his 
Epistles (vii. 330) Plato refers to the lover of wisdom as making use of that food 
for the day which may " make him specially quick to learn and of good memory, 
and able to reason in himself by being an abstainer {neephonta)." Burgess' trans- 
lation renders neephonta here, 'abstaining from wine.' 

Plutarch {Conviv. Quest, iv. 2) states that the Greeks offer sacrifices which are 
abstemious {neephalia), and with oblations of honey, in distinction from others 
where the honey is accompanied with wine.* Elsewhere {De San. Prcecep.) he 
remarks that "we often present to Bacchus himself abstemious oblations 
{neephalia), being very properly not habituated always to seek unmixed wine." 
In his ' Life of Romulus ' he mentions a goddess called Rumalia, the protectress 
of children, to whom sober sacrifices {neephalia) were made, and on whose altars 
libations of milk were poured out. More interesting, however, than all the rest, 
and more apt and conclusive, is the use of neepho and its derivatives by two of St 
Paul's Jewish contemporaries — Josephus and Philo. Josephus employs the word 

*" Among the Greeks," says Athenaeus, "those who sacrifice to the Sun make their libations of 
honey, as they never bring wine to the altars of the gods, saying it is proper that the god who 
keeps the whole universe in order, regulating everything, and always going round and superin- 
tending the whole, should in no manner be connected with drunkenness" (lib. xv. c. 48;. 



364 CRITICAL REMARKS ON ' NEEPHO,' ETC. 

three times — once figuratively {Wars, b. ii. c. 12, s. 1), and twice literally, in 
reference to the priests (Antiq. b. iii. c. 12, s. 2) : — " They are in all respects 
pure and abstinent {neephaliot), being forbidden to drink wine while they wear 
the priestly robe" — i. e. when officially on duty, doing God's work. So (Wars, 
b. v. c. 5, s. i), in referring to the temple, when restored by Herod, he states 
that the priests who were permitted to go up into the inner temple (naos) were 
without bodily blemish, and were clothed in linen, and "especially were abstainers 
from unmixed wine {apo akratou neephontes), so that they might not at all trans- 
gress in their ministerial service." 

Philo is equally explicit in his treatise on 'Drunkenness' (sec. 32). "The 
truly wise man," he says, "aims to offer abstemious sacrifices, steadfastly set- 
ting himself, in the firmness of his mind, against wine and every cause of folly 
{neephalia thuein, oinou kai pantos tou herein aitou bebaioteeti dianoiari)." In 
section 37 he refers to the regenerate soul as denying "that it has made use of 
wine and strong drink, boasting that it abstains {neephein) continually and during 
the whole of its life." He goes on further to speak of such a soul as "sur- 
charged with unmixed sobriety (neepseos akratou emphoreetheuta), and both being 
in itself, and poured out as, an undivided libation to God." 

(3) The texts cited from the Lxx. establish the abstinent meaning of neepho in 
combination with ek. 

(4) There are numerous passages in the classical authors where neepho and its 
derivatives are used in contrast with a state of drunkenness ; some of these are cited 
in a note;* but they are chiefly valuable as showing that when an antithesis to 
heavy drinking was desired, it was found in the word already in use to designate 
the absence of intoxicating fluids. A further use of neepho occurs in ancient authors 
as indicating the cool, self-possessed state of a person who has not been drinkingjt 
and such a figurative usage is obviously dependent for all its propriety and force 
upon the primary and radical signification of the word as separation from wine. 

3. The foregoing excursus will cast light upon the apostolic use of neepho and 
neephalios. It cannot be supposed that St Paul and St Peter employed these 
specific terms without a knowledge of their primary sense ; and it devolves upon 
the wine-drinker to show, if he is able, that as used by the sacred writers these 
terms mean something short of abstinence from intoxicating liquors. 

Dean Alford takes up the position, as a last resort, that, in the apostles' days, 
the proper etymological sense of the words neepho and neephalios had become 
obsolete ! But it is demonstrated above that this statement is very far from the 
truth. The exact contrary is the case. Professor Jowett, and literary history itself, 
have been cited to prove that, from the times of Daniel and Pythagoras to that of 
the Essenes and Therapeutae, the practice and opinion expressed by the word had 
become more pervading and popular, and more closely associated with conceptions 

* Theognis, in his Maxims (1. 478), has ' I am neither quite sober {neepho) nor yet very drunk ' (lieen 
methuo). In 1. 482, he alludes to scandalous words which to the sober {neephosi) are disgraceful : and 
in 1. 627 he affirms it 'disgraceful for the tippler (metkuonta) to be among sober men {neephosin), and 
for the sober man to be among tipplers.' Plutarch quotes the proverb that what is in the heart of the 
sober man {neephontos) is on the tongue of the tippler {metlniontos) . 

Plato, in his 'Laws' (books i. ii.), discusses the question whether drinking-parties might not be 
regulated to advantage if put under the control of wise and sober men. Carystius is cited by 
Athenseus for a saying of Philip of Macedon, — ' Let us drink ; it's enough for Antipatrus to be sober ' 
{neephein). In the Anthology an epigram is preserved to the effect that while Okindunos, among 
all the tipplers, wished to be sober {neephein), he was the only one who seemed to the others to be 
drunk. 

t Epicharmus's epigram is famous, naphe kai memtias' apistein, ' be cool, and don't believe too 
fast.' Longinus describes a writer who exercises great restraint in the midst of much ardor — en 
bakcheumasi neephein. Nero, when urging himself to suicide, exclaimed, Neephein dei er tois 
toiautois, ' it behooves thee to be self-possessed in these critical circumstances. ' 



I THESSALONIANS, V. 21. 365 

of moral purity and religious duty. The extraordinary and philological position of the 
Dean, therefore is, that as the fact and faith expressed by the words became more 
definite and distinct to the mind, the phrases grew more lax and vague in their 
signification ! In other words, it is gravely contended, that when known Greek 
abstainers used the very words which ' no doubt primarily referred ' to absti- 
nence, those words failed to express the fact ! ' The force of prejudice can no 
farther go.' 

Long after the apostles' days, excellent Greek writers used the word in the 
primary and proper sense of abstinence. For example, Porphyry (De Abst. i. 27) 
has to de neephaleon men kai aoinon to poton, 'but to be sober, and drink no wine.' 
The Latin paraphrast translates, ' But sobriety will be needful to one who has to 
keep much awake, potus sine vino, a drink without wine. ' Even Dean Alford does 
not deny the facts, for he concedes that 'the words neephon, neephaleos, etc., 
primarily refer, no doubt, to abstinence from wine.'* 

Were it even granted that they bear in the New Testament the sense of strict 
sobriety and perfect self-possession, the apostolic meaning would be, ' Be as sober 
and self-possessed as those who do not touch wine ' — a distinguished compliment 
to total abstinence. It will then remain for those who profess to be doers of the 
word in its spirit as well as letter, to explain how they can be said to take heed to 
such counsel, if they regularly consume alcoholic liquors of a potency entirely 
unknown in apostolic times. The practice of the modern abstainer does not exceed 
the legitimate import of these ancient words. He is a neephalist, whoever else is 
not, and is, in consequence, fully prepared to realize all the moral advantages with 
which the habit of abstinence has been associated, in all ages and climes. As a 
Christian, he has good reason to expect that his neephalism will increase his ability 
to appropriate all the blessings of the Christian dispensation, while he works out 
his salvation with fear and trembling, but without any vinous hindrance to the 
effectual co-operation of the Holy Spirit of God. 



Chapter V. Verse 21. 
Prove all things ; hold fast that which is good. 



Prove all things] Panta dokimazete, 'make proof of all things.' 



Here is a warning against prejudiced and hasty rejection of what is novel or 
opposed to previous sentiment and practice. All things should be proved — can- 
didly, fairly, freely ; and the method of proof must be adapted to the thing under 
examination. If experimental proof be possible, to rest content with theoretical 
reasoning is exceedingly unwise : hence the importance of giving total abstinence 
a trial rather than arguing about it, and nothing more, as so many do. The prin- 
ciple reduced to practice becomes its own most powerful advocate, whenever its 
practice is adopted in good faith and for a sufficiently long term. The trial should 
also be judicious, — not associated, for example, with other changes of diet which 
may prove injurious, and bring discredit on the disuse of intoxicating drinks. 
Had abstinence been impartially tried, and held fast when found to be good, it 
would long ere this have superseded those drinking habits and usages by which 

* The Dean, in the same controversial letter, says, ' Dr Lees is bound to prove that abstinence 
means total abstinence ' ! Now the abstainer is no more bound to prove that neepfto means a little 
drinking than that neestis, 'fasting,' means 'a little eating '(Matt. xv. 32). 



366 I THESSALONIANS, V. 22. 

the most enlightened nations of the world are at once corrupted, scourged, and 
enslaved. 



Chapter V. Verse 22. 
Abstain from all appearance of evil. 



The Greek reads, apo pantos eidous poneerou apechesthe, * from every aspect of 
evil hold yourselves aloof.' 



This precept is commonly quoted as if by ' appearance ' {eidos) were meant the 
semblance of evil as well as the reality, — the sense being ' abstain from everything 
that not only is evil, but that looks like evil.' Dean Alford has strongly con- 
demned this construction ; but Webster and Wilkinson, in their Greek edition of 
the Testament, remark, "Eidos in New Test, has its primary signification, 'that 
which is an object of sight,' 'visible,' 'appearance,' — 'keep aloof from everything 
that has an evil appearance,' that looks like evil, 'from all suspicious things' 
(Tyndale). The primary object of the injunction probably is to restrain any 
unseemly or suspicious exhibitions at the public services of the church, in 
doctrine and precept, and in the mode of delivering both ; and hence, of course, 
in their practice generally, they are to avoid everything that might bring a reproach 
upon the name of Christ." 

It may be allowed that the apostle is not referring to apparent evil as opposed to 
actual evil, yet he evidently means more than evil generically considered, else he 
might have omitted eidos altogether. He conceives of evil as having many forms 
or aspects, — some gross and repellant, others subtle and seductive; and he enjoins 
upon Christians that they should hold off from evil, whatever guise it may assume. 
Satan may clothe himself as an angel of light, but he is none the less to be shunned 
as the prince of darkness. Owing to the tendency of men to mistake evil for good, 
the exhortation is never out of season "to prove all things, hold fast the good, and 
to hold aloof from every form of evil, however little of evil that form may directly 
express." Possibly some things that look like evil are not so, and therefore should 
not be avoided ; yet it is safest to exercise extreme caution in avoiding what seems 
evil, rather than rashly to assume that evil is really absent where it is apparently 
present. In morals this adage is pertinent, — 'Where there's smoke there's fire.' 
Of persons we should judge charitably and hope the best, but of habits we cannot 
be too suspicious and circumspect. It is an unquestionable Christian duty to avoid 
not only every form of evil, but even whatever is a cause of evil to ourselves or 
others, wherever its avoidance is consistent with the claims and purposes of life. 
Scientific experiment proves that alcoholic liquor is evil as a beverage, and universal 
experience shows that, as a cause of evil — physical, moral, and religious, domestic, 
social, and national, — it is altogether unequalled by any other instrument of mischief 
ever known to man. It is an article all the more to be dreaded, because, while 
generally impressing mankind with confidence in its virtue, in its potency as a 
formative element of evil it can be compared to nothing short of the mysterious 
and terrible agency ascribed to ' the powers of the air ' and ' spiritual wickednesses 
in high places. ' Is it possible, then, to keep aloof from it too remotely and too 
persistently ? 



THE FIRST EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO TIMOTHY. 



Chapter III. Verses 2, 3. 

2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, 
vigilant, sober, of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach; 
3 Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre ; but patient, 
not a brawler, not covetous. 



V. 2. Vigilant] Neephaleon, ' abstinent ' ; Wiclif and Tyndale have ' sober ' } 
the Vulgate has sobrium. There can be no reason to give to neephaleon here a 
figurative sense; and if such a sense were supposed, it would be more suitably 
expressed by 'self-collected' than by 'vigilant.' Codices Aleph, A, and D read 
neephalion (i instead of e), a mere orthographic difference. 

Sober] Sophrona, ' of sound mind ' = sober-minded. The order of terms is 
instructive. The Christian overseer is to be neephaleon, ' abstinent ' — strictly sober 
in body, in order that he may be sober in mind. Wiclif has ' prudent ' ; Tyndale 
' discrete ' ; the Vulgate has prudentem. 

V. 3. Not given to wine] Mee paroinon, ' not near wine ' == a banqueter. 
The composition of this word is para, 'near,' and oinos, 'wine'; and the ancient 
paroinos was a man accustomed to attend drinking-parties, and, as a consequence, 
to become intimately associated with strong drink. As the Christian bishop ( = 
overseer) had been previously enjoined to be neephalion, it is probable that the 
apostle intended by this word paroinos not so much the absence of personal inso- 
briety, as absence from convivial entertainments where drinking was systematically 
practiced, frequently terminating in quarrels and blows. The Christian minister 
must not only be himself sober, but he must withhold his presence and sanction 
from places and associations dangerous to the sobriety of himself and others. 

Section 54 of the 'Law Book of the Ante-Nicene Church' has the following 
canon : — " If any one of the clergy be taken (even) eating in a tavern, let him be 
suspended, unless he is forced to bait at an inn upon the road." 

£See Note on parallel passage, Titus i. 7, 8.] 



Chapter III. Verse 8. 



Likewise must the deacons be grave, not double-tongued, not given 
to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre. 



368 I TIMOTHY, III. 8. 



Not given to much wine] Mee oino polio pvsechontas, ' not addicted to much 
wine.' The previous Note on ver. 3 will show that the apparent distinction in the 
counsel to bishops 'not given to wine,' and to deacons 'not given to much wine,' 
has no foundation in the terms of the original. 

The inference that some use of intoxicating liquor is sanctioned by this interdic- 
tion of ' much wine ' will be found, on examination, premature and illusive. 

1. Excessive drinking, even of uninebriating drinks, was a vice prevalent in the 
days of St Paul, and corresponded to gluttony, also common, — the excessive use of 
food, but not of an intoxicating kind. Prizes were often offered with the object, 
not of producing inebriation, but of testing the powers of incontinent imbibition 
to the utmost. Not a few of the early officers of Christian churches were, probably, 
selected from men who had been notorious for such practices (called methusoi, 
'topers,' by St Paul in writing to the Corinthians, 1st Epistle, vi. 10, 'and such 
were some of you,' ver. Il); and the apostle here reminds them that such conduct 
is inconsistent with their ' high calling ' as faithful servants of the Lord Jesus. He 
is directing his exhortation against a common vice, and is not pronouncing any 
opinion upon the nature of intoxicating liquors. 

2. To argue that by forbidding ' much wine ' St Paul approves some use of wine 
of any and every sort, is to adopt a mode of interpretation exceedingly dangerous, 
and wholly inconsistent with common usage. (1) It is highly dangerous; for once 
lay it down that what is not forbidden is approved, and the Bible becomes a book 
of the wildest license : ' Thou shalt do no murder ' becomes a permission to do 
violence short of murder ; and ' Let not the sun go down upon thy wrath ' is a 
reason for indulging in anger of any kind from sunrise to sunset ! (2) It is incon- 
sistent with usage. When the apostle Peter says that the enemies of Christ won- 
dered that believers did not go to ' the same excess of riot ' as themselves, he did 
not mean that Christians might indulge in any minor excess. The next clause in this 
verse illustrates the same point, — mee aischrokerdeis, ' not greedy-of-filthy-lucre,' or 
'not meanly-avaricious,' says the apostle, but without any intention of justifying 
avarice or trade craftiness in the smallest degree. So in the present day a Christian 
may condemn some excess, without implying that a less indulgence would be 
commendable ; nay, times without number, teetotalers have blamed men for going 
' so much ' to the public-house, without signifying any approval of occasional visits. 
Besides, it is morally impossible that St Paul could have intended to approve of 
some use of all sorts of wine then made and used. Many wines were drugged ; 
did he recommend these ? In his day, also, even sober heathens disapproved of 
the use of fermented wine unless considerably diluted with water, — was the Chris- 
tian moralist less indifferent than pagans to sobriety ? Various wines, too, were so 
nauseous to a modern taste, that no apostolic patronage, however explicit, would 
have induced English wine-drinkers to swallow them. 

3. If it is asked why St Paul did not directly forbid all use of wine ? — both a 
special and a general answer may be returned. (1) The particular answer is, that 
the term oinos (wine) included a great variety of drinks made from the juice of the 
grape ; and as many of these were free from an intoxicating quality, and others 
were so weakened by water as to be practically non-inebriating unless voraciously 
consumed, a universal proscription would have ignored important distinctions that 
were well known to exist. (2) The general answer is, that, for wisest ends, the 
apostle refrained from condemning by name much which the development of 
Christian light and the operation of Christian love would hereafter show to be 
inconsistent with the principles of the Christian system; and which, therefore, 
would be renounced by true and enlightened disciples. Slave-holding, arbitrary 



I TIMOTHY, IV. 3 — 5. 369 

government, bigamy and polygamy, lots and gambling, were not prohibited. 
Numerous objectionable customs of ancient times were not forbidden in express 
terms. The apostles, it is clear, trusted to the effectual working of that Spirit of 
truth and grace which dwelt in the Church, for the gradual elevation of human 
character, and the progressive extinction of institutions and habits that were in any 
degree discordant with the Divine principles of the Gospel. To obey the Father 
in all things ; to be like the Son in purity ; to love as brethren ; to do good at all 
sacrifices, as we have opportunity ; to suffer, rather than inflict wrong ; to resist 
unavoidable temptation, and shun what we can; to make earth spiritually one 
with heaven, — these were first principles which, conscientiously lived out, would 
cover and comprehend all circumstances, and, in the long run, banish evil from 
the world. Detailed and specific prohibitions, as under the Jewish theocracy, are 
not of the genius of Christianity ; at any rate, we know they were not given ; and 
what is most needed now, is an honest wish to apply the unchangeable canons of 
Christian morality to every case of conscience as it arises, making such use of the 
Old Testament as may enable us to perceive more clearly what is most practically 
advantageous to us in this glorious endeavor. Actuated by this spirit, the ques- 
tion will be — not whether intoxicating wine is prohibited by name in the New 
Testament, but whether Scripture and Experience afford us such a knowledge of its 
nature and results as, on Christian principles, binds us to renounce and dis- 
countenance its use ? 



Chapter III. Verse ii. 
Even so must their wives be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in 
all things. 



Sober] Neephalious, ' abstinent.' The A. V. here renders by ' sober ' the same 
word rendered ' vigilant ' in ver. 2. Among the Romans the use of intoxicating 
wine (anciently called temetum) was rigorously forbidden to all women, who, on 
this account, were termed abstemice (from ads, 'from,' and temetum, 'wine'). The 
first inhabitants of the seven-hilled City attached more importance to female 
sobriety than is done by some professedly Christian nations. In Rome the primi- 
tive temperance and chastity were, in lapse of time, superseded by luxurious indul- 
gence and intemperance, — so that it was not without cause that in the apostle's 
days women were enjoined to practice the strictest sobriety. Not satisfied with 
the use of passum, a sweet raisin-wine, which had been anciently permitted, 
fashionable ladies had come to rival men in drinking-orgies ; and Juvenal draws a 
disgusting picture of the zest with which they made even innocent must to pander 
to their debauched and morbid tastes. In Austria to this day, the ancient law of 
female abstinence has been fostered, with the happiest result : so that, in the whole 
kingdom, probably, there are not to be found as many female drunkards as exist 
in an English town or an American village. 



Chapter IV. Verses 3 — 5. 
3 Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, 
which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them 
which believe and know the truth. 4 For every creature of God is 
good, and nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving : 
5 For it is sanctified by the word of God and prayer. 
47 



370 I TIMOTHY, IV. 3 — 5. 

The 'meats ' (dromata) referred to by the apostle, include the fruits of the earth, 
and whatever is fit to be eaten ; but to quote this text, as some have done, in 
opposition to the temperance cause, is a lamentable perversion of Divine truth. 
(i) Intoxicating liquors are not 'meats,' the amount of nourishment in them being 
infinitesimally small.* (2) In their manufacture a great destruction of good food 
inevitably occurs. (3) By their consumption, the means of procuring suitable and 
sufficient food are denied to tens of thousands of families in our country alone. 
(4) Abstinence from them would at once stimulate the demand and supply of food 
to an extent hitherto unknown. 

Every ' creature of God ' {ktisma, created thing) ' is good ' in the place where 
He has placed it, and for the purpose for which He has designed it; nor is any- 
thing He has fitted for food to be refused — cast away — churlishly or super- 
stitiously ; but to be accepted with thanksgiving, being sanctified to the user by the 
Word of God and by prayer. The fundamental idea of this passage is, that the 
brbma or ktisma is innocuous, safe, and adapted to the human organism by the 
Creator. In regard to intoxicating drink, this idea is not only not realized, but is 
essentially reversed. There is an expressive proverb that drinkers well know, but 
are very apt to forgot — " God sends us food, and the devil sends us cooks." This 
evinces that the common mind quite understands the difference between God's 
work and brewers' work — between nature and art — between that which demon- 
strates the Divine wisdom, and that which simply proves human perversity and 
depravity. Who would tolerate the language made explicit, which, by an abuse 
of the words of this passage, makes God not only a ' Creator,' but a brewer and a 
gin-spinner? Stripped of its varnished pretence of piety, this is virtually what 
the objector contends for, when he foolishly asserts that " alcohol is a creature, and 
therefore to be received with thanksgiving." The analyses and experiments of 
science prove, beyond all reasonable doubt, that alcohol is not 'meat' or food; 
and not less so that Nature, in her laboratory, abstains from producing this special 
article and seductive poison. "Nature," said Count Chaptal, the great French 
chemist, half a century ago, "never forms spirituous liquors; she rots the grape 
upon the branch, but it is art which converts the juice into [alcoholic] wine." Pro- 
fessor Turner, in his 'Chemistry,' also affirms the non-natural character of alcohol. 
" It does not exist ready formed in plants, but is a product of the vinous fermen- 
tation " — a process which must be initiated, superintended, and, at a certain state, 
arrested by art. The term ' sanctified ' shows that the apostle is here writing 
against those who attached a ceremonial uncleanness to certain meats, or against 
the early Gnostics, who asci-ibed all moral evil to material things. In opposition 
to both theories, Paul teaches that nothing which is intrinsically adapted for food 
is 'unclean' or 'evil,' and that it becomes, on the contrary, 'sanctified,' set apart 
to a sacred use, if its reception is accompanied by devotion and praise. In this 
teaching everything is in beautiful accordance with the Temperance principle, but 
entirely out of harmony with the drinking system in all its parts ; for alcohol is not 

* In an Analytical Report on Wines, published in the Lancet of October 26, 1867, it is said, " In 
every 1,000 gram measures of the clarets and burgundies tested, the mean amount of albuminous 
matter present was only 1% grain, while in 1,000 grains by weight of raw beef there are no less than 
207 grains of such matter ; that is, the quantities being equal, beefsteak is 156 times more nutritious 
than wine. These figures clearly demonstrate the fact that the nutritive properties of the wines 
referred to are exceedingly small, and the same statement applies equally to the Hungarian and 
Greek wines analyzed : and, doubtless also, though not quite to the same extent, to the heavier and 
richer wines, the ports and sherries." We find even so interested a witness as the great wine- 
importing firm of Gilbey conceding in their annual circular dated October, 1867, that the fermen- 
tation of grape-juice "throws off much of the body and richness of the fruit, so much so, indeed, 
that it must be admitted the similarity of the juice of the grape before and after fermentation is 
scarcely discernible " ! 



I TIMOTHY, V. 22, 23. 37 1 

a food, is not a creature of God (in the sense here intended), its acceptance has 
never been Divinely commanded, and its tendency to disturb and to destroy the 
temple of man's body is not diminished by any thankfulness with which it is 
mistakenly received.* 



Chapter V. Verse 22. 



Lay hands suddenly on no man, neither be partaker of other men's 
sins: keep thyself pure. 



That we may not partake of other men's sins, we must not place in their path, 
but remove from it, all occasions of transgression. An acquaintance with human 
nature and social life will not leave us ignorant upon this point ; and who does 
not know that the great bulk of the sins and crimes and sorrows of our nation 
originate in the use of intoxicating liquors, and the temptations to that use every- 
where diffused by fashion and law ? In the vigilant and earnest effort to keep our- 
selves 'pure,' we must give a personal application to the knowledge we acquire of 
human infirmities, and the sources of human error and failure. Self-confidence 
must be repressed, and every impulse towards self-security, where others have 
fallen. How often has the Christian professor exclaimed, in regard to intem- 
perance, ' Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing ? ' — And yet he has 
done it, and done it because 'wine is a mocker and strong drink is raging.' 
Personal purity cannot, prudently, dispense with any available guard ; and it is an 
office of Divine grace to indicate what these precautions are, and to incite to their 
employment. Hence a knowledge -of the deceitful influence of strong drink and 
the havoc it has wrought should suffice for its exclusion, by way of negative 
protection to that pureness of heart and life which is above all price. Especially 
in regard to sexual impurity is the avoidance of alcoholic drink a defence that can- 
not be too highly esteemed. Gross licentiousness could hardly be publicly visible 
were its alliance with the fiery spirit of the vat dissolved. 



Chapter V. Verse 23. 

Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake 
and thine often infirmities. 



Drink no longer water] Meeketi ktidropdtei, ' no longer drink water ' = no 
longer be ' a drinker of water as thy only beverage.' ' To drink water,' and ' to be 
a water drinker,' had a special signification among the Greeks, as among ourselves, 
that of not using inebriating drinks. 

But use a little wine] Air oino oligo chro, 'but make use of a little wine,' 
probably, as suggested by some commentators, wine mixed with water — the only 
way in which sober pagans took even fermented liquors ; at a time, too, when such 

* " They thereby [not being content with his Creature] insult the Creator, who hath bestowed on 
man the powers and faculties of innocent enjoyment. EpegnOkosi teen aleethian — meaning, ' those 
who have fully known the truth concerning meats ' : a knowledge, as Macknight says, necessary to 
render the eating lawful. 

" For every creature of God.] These words serve to explain the preceding, ' who know the truth ' ; 
containing, as Hyperius observes, an argtimentum a causa finali; q. d., 'who well know, I say, 
that everything created and supplied by God [for meat] is good and fit to be eaten.' Compare Gen. 
i 31 "—(which was quite antecedent to brewing).— Dr S. T. Bloomfield's Annotations. 



372 I TIMOTHY, V. 23. 



liquors could not be ' fortified ' with ardent spirit, as is now done with nearly all 
the wines consumed in this country. 

For thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities] Dia ton stomachon 
sou kai tas puknas sou asiheneias, * on account of thy stomach and thy frequent 
weaknesses.' Codices Aleph, A, and D, omit the latter sou, 'thine.' Wiclif's 
version runs, — "Nyle thou yit drynke water, but use a littel wyne for the stomak 
and for the ofte fallynge in firmytees." Tyndale has 'thyne often diseases,' which 
is followed by Cranmer's and the Geneva version. 



The reader will peruse with interest the thoughts of some eminent divines upon 
this much abused text : — 

Chrysostom. — "Why did not Paul restore strength to his stomach? Not 
because he could not — for he whose garment had raised the dead was clearly able 
to do this too, — but because he had a design of importance in withholding such 
aid. What, then, was his purpose? That even now, if we see great and virtuous 
men afflicted with infirmities, we may not be offended ; for this was a profitable 
visitation. If, indeed, to Paul a messenger of Satan was sent, that he should not 
be exalted above measure, much more might it be so with Timothy, since the 
miracles he wrought were enough to make him arrogant. For this reason he is 
kept subjected to the rules of medicine, that he may be humbled and others may 
not be offended, but may learn that they who performed such excellent actions 
were men of the same nature as themselves. In other respects also Timothy seems 
to have been exposed to disease, as implied by that expression, 'thine often 
infirmities,' as well of other parts as of the stomach. He does not, however, 
allow him to indulge freely in wine, but as much as was for health and not for 
luxury." 

Calvin. — " What is said amounts to this : that Timothy should accustom 
himself to drink a little wine for the sake of preserving his health ; for he does not 
absolutely forbid him to drink water, but to use it as his ordinary beverage ; and 
that is the meaning of the Greek hydropotein. But why does he not simply advise 
him to drink wine? for when he adds 'a little' he appears to guard against 
intemperance, which there was no reason to dread in Timothy. I reply, this was 
rather expressed in order to meet the slanders of wicked men, who would otherwise 
have been ready to mock at his advice, on this or some such pretext: — 'What 
sort of philosophy is this which encourages to drink wine ? Is that the road by 
which we rise to heaven ? ' In order to meet jeers of this kind he declares that 
he provides only for a case of necessity, and at the same time he recommends 
moderation. How few are there at the present day who need to be forbidden the 
use of water ; or rather, how many are there that need to be exhorted to drink 
wine soberly ! It is also evident how necessary it is for us, even when we are 
desirous to act rightly, to ask from the Lord the spirit of prudence, that He may 
teach us moderation." 

Dr Gill. — " Some by ' a little wine,' understand not the quantity but the quality 
of the wine; a thin, small, weak wine, or wine mixed with water; and so the 
Ethiopic version renders the words, " drink no more simple water (or water only), 
but mix a little wine." Not as though there was any danger of Timothy's running 
into an excess of drinking, but for the sake of others, lest they should choose such 
a direction to indulge themselves in an excessive way ; and chiefly to prevent the 
scoffs of profane persons, who otherwise would have insinuated that the apostle 
indulged in intemperance and excess ; whereas this advice to the use of wine was 



I TIMOTHY, V. 23. 373 



not for pleasure and for the satisfying of the flesh, but for health, — 'for thy 
stomach's sake,' to help digestion, and to remove the disorders which might attend 
it. The Ethiopic version renders it, ' for the pain of thy liver and for thy perpetual 
disease ' ; which last might be a pain in his head, arising from the disorder of his 
stomach. The last clause we render, 'and thine often infirmities,' or weaknesses 
of body, occasioned by hard studies, frequent ministrations, and indefatigable pains 
and labors endured in spreading the gospel of Christ." 

Dr Hammond, in his learned 'Annotations' (1653). — " Use a little wine. 
This may be safely done by thee without incurring that danger of pollution, 
(ver. 22). Without this way of setting it, it will not be conceivable how that which 
immediately follows (ver. 23), should come in, * Drink no longer water.' Yet this 
I say, not to inderdict thee the medicinal use of wine." 

Dr Wordsworth, Canon of Westminster (Introduction and Notes to Greek 
New Testament). — " ' Be no longer an hydropotecs, ' a water drinker,' showing that 
hitherto Timothy had been such. Thus St Paul bears testimony, and (as this 
epistie was read in the church) a public testimony, to the temperance of the bishop 
of Ephesus. Observe the prudent caution of the apostle's language. He does not 
say meeketi hudor pine (no longer drink water), but meeketi kudropotei (be no longer 
a water-drinker) ; nor does he say, oinon pine {drink wine), but oino oligo chro 
(use a little wine) ; nor does he say dia teen gasteera (on account of thy belly), but 
dia ton stomachon sou (on account of thy stomach)." 



Obs. 1. The commentators have not got the true key to the passage, and hence 
their conjectures and variations. ' Wine is a mocker ' to the judgment as well as 
to the hope. The apparent abruptness in the introduction of this verse has induced 
in some expositors a suspicion of its genuineness, and has led others (as Calvin and 
Doddridge) to suggest that it may have formed at first a private marginal remark, 
and been transferred by some transcriber to its present place. The difficulty of 
allocation may be removed by supposing that when the apostle had written the 
words, ' Keep thyself pure,' he remembered that, for this object, Timothy had con- 
formed to the Nazarites' rule of abstinence, and calling to mind Timothy's state 
of ill-health, he added, 'Drink no longer water,' etc., the connection of thought 
being of this kind: — "Keep thyself pure — do so by all means, but let not thy 
laudable anxiety for this end hinder thee using such wine t in small quantities, as 
will diminish thy stomachic and frequent disorders." 

2. The advice of St Paul is to be regarded as an expression of his paternal 
kindness, and not as a peremptory and dictatorial mandate. St Paul did not so 
much order his beloved son in the gospel to drink wine as give him permission to 
do so, using a persuasiveness without which he doubtless knew Timothy would 
not swerve from his rule of life. Timothy was between thirty and forty years of 
age, and had probably adhered to this regimen from his earliest youth. Nor is it 
fanciful to suppose that the habit had been formed beneath the eye, and aided by 
the precept and example of his mother Lois and his grandmother Eunice. Under 
their training he had ' known the Scriptures from a child ' ; and those passages 
which describe the seductive influence of wine and strong drink had not been 
overlooked by the youthful student and his maternal instructors. 

3. The apostle does not ground his advice upon those objections to abstinence 
so common with opponents of the Temperance Reform. He says not a word 
about asceticism, about rejecting the bounties of Providence, about the duty of 
encouraging temptation, or the intrinsic virtue of 'moderation,' etc. ; nor does he 



374 I TIMOTHY, V. 23. 



reflect on the motives of Timothy's abstinence, or insinuate that it was unfitted 
for him in health or for men in general ; but his language seems specially intended 
to guard against any encouragement to a common use of vinous liquors — against, 
in fact, the very treatment it has received from the advocates of tippling. 

4. Nothing is plainer about this advice than that it was meant for Timothy alone, 
and for reasons personal to him — his stomach affection and frequent maladies. 
St Paul did not set up for physician-general to the Christian world in all ages, nor 
did he prescribe wine as a panacea for all the diseases that flesh is heir to. If the 
advice was given * by commandment,' and not as an individual opinion, all its value 
was derived from particular knowledge of the case. Of such knowledge, however, 
modern drinkers are entirely destitute. They can only guess at the nature of the 
disease, and wish for the special remedy to be such wine as they like. But he who, 
for himself or others, prescribes a generic remedy for a generic disease — or, in 
plain English, makes an unknown complaint, and an unknown remedy recorded in 
antiquity, the ground of a modern prescription for a specific ailment, is rather a fool 
than a physician. 

5. The advice itself would be received with filial respect by Timothy, and acted 
upon with an enlightened spirit. (1) He would use ' a little wine,' and as seldom 
as needs be ; not for gratification, but for medicinal service. (2) He would have 
regard to the end, and not conclude that a medicine once prescribed was to be 
continued after it had answered its designed effect. (3) As oinos was the word 
used, he would feel at liberty to take oinos (wine) of any species that was most 
salutary, preferring, we may be sure, those kinds that were least exciting, and that 
ministered least to sensualism and public vice. It is by no means certain that he 
would even use an intoxicating sort of wine at all, for Pliny's account of wines 
(book xiv.) shows that some sorts in good repute were not fermented; and of 
adunamon ('without strength'), one of the artificial vina (wines), he expressly 
declares that it was given to invalids when the ordinary wines were deemed likely 
to be injurious. In book xxiii. chap. 26 he frankly remarks, that "to treat of the 
medicinal properties of each particular kind of wine would be labor without end, 
and quite inexhaustible ; and the more so as the opinions of medical men are so 
entirely at variance upon the subject." Athenseus also speaks of the 'mild Chian' 
and the 'sweet Bibline.' He says, " The sweet wine (gluhus), which among the 
Sicilians is called Pollian, may be the same as the biblinos oinos" (lib. i. chap. 56). 
Of the sweet Lesbian he says, " Let him take glukus, either mixed with water or 
warmed, especially that called protropos, as being very good for the stomach " (lib. 
ii. chap. 24).* 

6. The bearing of this text upon the Temperance Reform can now be distinctly 
perceived: — (1 ) It does not condemn or discountenance abstinence from intoxi- 
cating liquor as a rule of life in health, or for the sake of health, much less where 
it is practiced from motives of benevolence and piety. (2) It does not sanction the 
use, of intoxicating liquor by men in general, or by any class or individual in par- 
ticular. It marks an exception to a rule ; and since that exception had respect to 



* The Materia Medica of Dr A. Todd Thomson, London, has the following, as to the conditions 
for prescribing wine : — " The quantity to be given, and the proper period of exhibiting it, require to 
be regulated with much judgment. The quantity to be given depends entirely on the nature of the 
disease, and the intentio?ts for which it is administered " (p. 715). " Where health abounds, wine is 
altogether unnecessary" (p. 716). " In Syria, the juice of ripe grapes inspissated, is used in great 
quantities in diseases." It may be observed, that in infirmities dependent either upon excessive wear 
and tear, or upon some defective supply of the salts of the blood, pure wine {i. e. the juice of grapes, 
unfermented) is the very best restorer, since it is rich in digestible albumen, and in phosphoric acid 
and the alkaline carbonates. Dr Curchod, of the wein-cur at Vevey, also says that it restores diges- 
tion and acts beneficially in bilious affections. 



I TIMOTHY, VI. 10. 375 



a lifelong abstainer, it is applicable very indirectly, if at all, to others. As to 
habitual wine-drinkers, the law of parallelism would indicate that when they are 
ill, they should try abstinence from the liquor which at least has not preserved 
them from disease. If wine is good as a medicine, then, like other medicine, it 
must prove most beneficial to those who are least accustomed to it when in health. 
(3) As Timothy had abstained from wines of all kinds, fermented and unfermented, 
boiled and unboiled, diluted and neat, he may have complied with the apostolic 
prescription without consuming a drop of alcoholic liquor. Even if he partook of 
some weak alcoholic wine, and derived benefit, no general conclusion in favor of 
using alcohol even in disease — much less in health — could be philosophically 
deduced ; and recent investigations have shown a great decrease in mortality where 
alcoholic liquors have been discarded from the treatment of the very diseases sup- 
posed to be best affected by their administration. Allowing — what is beyond 
proof — that St Paul advised an abstainer to use a little alcoholic liquor as a 
medicine, the records of sophistry can hardly produce a match to the monstrous 
conclusion — " Therefore, alcoholic liquors of all sorts are fit to be habitually 
taken, by persons of all conditions, whether they are well or whether they are 
ill"!! 



Chapter VI. Verse 10. 

For the love of money is the root of all evil : which while some 
coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves 
through with many sorrows. 

1. This passage has been strangely cited in opposition to the statement that 
strong drink is the source of much of the evil which afflicts and demoralizes 
Society. But no text of Scripture can disprove a fact open to universal observa- 
tion ; and it is doing dishonor to the Bible to bring it into even apparent collision 
with the experience of mankind. 

2. There is a further misapplication of this verse in quoting it as if * money ' 
were referred to as the root of all evil, and not the love -of -money, which is 
expressed by one word in the original— -philarguria. Hence there is no true 
parallel between money — which is the passive object of undue desire and abuse — 
and strong drink, the physical action of which on the nerves and brain begets that 
craving and appetite for itself which is at once a taint to the body and a tyranny 
to the soul. 

3. It may be strongly doubted whether the apostle intended to assert what the 
A. V. ascribes to him — that love of money (the amor sceleratus habendi of Ovid) 
is really the root of all evil. (Dr Hammond paraphrases — 'what a deal of mis- 
chief.') Covetousness is certainly not the root of all moral evil, nor is all, or a 
major part of, human misery attributable to it. St Paul's words are — rhiza gar 
panton ton kakon, ' for covetousness is a root of all the evils ' — i. e. of all the evils 
just mentioned in the previous verse, — but not the exclusive root of even these ; a 
much more moderate proposition, and one confirmed by universal observation. 

4. Not the least glaring illustration of the accursed love of mammon is painfully 
exhibited by the colossal and retail traders in alcohol. Except for this philarguria, 
that traffic would not exist. The retailers ' go into ' the ' public house ' trade to make 
a profit; many expect (to their disappointment) to gain a fortune; and the same 
inducement is the mainspring of the wholesale manufacturers and dealers. They 
may not intend to do harm, but though they see the infinite mischief inflicted, they 



376 I TIMOTHY, VI. 10. 



continue to trade in the waters of death. The effect upon themselves and their 
families is frequently deplorable. John Wesley said of the drink-dealers of his 
time, "All who sell spirituous liquors in the common way to any that will buy, are 
poisoners-general. They murder His [God's] subjects by wholesale, neither does 
their eye pity or spare. They drive them to hell like sheep ; and what is their gain ? 
Is it not the blood of these men ? Who, then, would envy their large estates and 
sumptuous palaces ? A curse is in the midst of them. Blood, blood is there ; the 
foundation, the floor, the walls, the roof are stained with blood. And canst thou 
hope, O thou man of blood ! though thou art clothed in scarlet and fine linen, and 
farest sumptuously every day — canst thou hope to deliver down the fields of blood 
to the third generation ? Not so ; for there is a God in heaven ; therefore, thy 
name shall be rooted out, like as those whom thou hast destroyed, body and soul ; 
thy memorial shall perish with thee." ( Works, vol. vi. 129.) 



THE 

EPISTLE OF ST PAUL TO TITUS. 



Chapter I. Verses 7, 8. 

7 For a bishop must be blameless, as the steward of God ; not 
selfwilled, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given to 
filthy lucre ; 8 But a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober, 
just, holy, temperate. 



V. 7. Not given to wine] Mee paroinon, 'not near wine ' = not a banqueter. 
[See Note on I Tim. iii. 3.] 

V. 8. Sober] Sdphrona, 'sober-minded.' 

Temperate] Enkratee, 'temperate' = self-restraining (as to the appetites) == 
abstinent. This word seems to answer to neephaleon in I Tim. iii. 3. [See Note 
on 1 Cor. ix. 25.] 



Chapter II. Verse 2. 
That the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in 
charity, in patience. 



Sober] Necphaleous, 'abstinent' [See Note on 1 Thess. v. 6.] 
Temperate] Sophronas, 'sober-minded.' 



These variations of translation in the English version are much to be regretted, 
since they hide the nice and just distinctions of the original, which point at once to 
a more comprehensive and more specific form of temperance than the world is 
willing to practice. These are, ( I ) the general virtue of temperance as self-restraint ; 
(2) that moderation of the soul called ' patience,' or ' gentleness ' ; (3) that subjective 
virtue called sound-mindedness, compounded of right seeing and right willing ; (4) 
the personal and specific practice of abstinence from things evil; and, therefore (5) r 
the discountenancing of drinking-fashions and feasts. To confound all these under 
the vague and modern meaning of * temperance,' is as absurd in criticism as it is 
injurious in morals. 

Chapter II. Verses 3 — 6. 
3 The aged women likewise, that they be in behavior as becometh 
holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good 
things ; 4 That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love 
48 



378 TITUS, II. II, 12. 



their husbands, to love their children, $ To be discreet, chaste, keepers 
at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God 
be not blasphemed. 6 Young men likewise exhort to be sober 
minded. 



V. 3. Not given to much wine] Mee oino polio dedoulomenas, * not addicted 
to much wine.' W. H. Rule, D.D., in his ' Brief Inquiry,' admits — " Grape-juice 
was chiefly known in antiquity as the casual drink of the peasantry ; when carefully 
preserved, as the choice beverage of epicures. The Roman ladies were so fond of 
it that they would first fill their stomachs with it, then throw it off by emetics, 
and repeat the draught" (Wetstein in Acts ii. 13). We have referred to Lucian 
for ourselves, and find the following illustration: — "I came, by Jove, as those 
who drink gleukos, swelling out their stomach, require an emetic " (Philops. 39). 
[See Note on 1 Tim. iii. 8.] 

V. 4. That they may teach the young women to be sober] Hina 
sophronizosi tas neas, ' in order that they may cause the young women to be sober- 
minded. ' 

V. 5. To be discreet] Sophronas, 'sober-minded.' 

V. 6. To be sober minded] Sophronein, ' to be sober-minded. 



Chapter II. Verses ii — 12. 

11 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to 
all men, 12 Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, 
we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world. 



Soberly] Sophronois, ' sobermindedly. ' 



The apostle most appropriately and expressively connects the denial or sup- 
pression of wordly lusts with the design of living ' sober-mindedly, righteously, 
and devoutly in the present age.' The connection of intoxicating liquor with such 
worldly lusts and the absence of sober-mindedness, rectitude, and piety, is too 
prevalent and flagrant to be denied. The grace of God — the Divine favor 
embodied in the Divine precepts, and impressing their holy dictates on the heart — 
is beautifully said to be ' teaching us ' the denial of those lusts. Yet ' teaching ' 
is too weak a rendering of paideuousa, which signifies 'training' or 'disciplining.' 
The office of Divine grace is not to sanction unsafe indulgence, and then prevent 
the natural consequences, but to train the soul to the avoidance of all illicit desires 
and fleshly tastes, and in short, of whatever is found in practice to interfere with 
the highest development of the Christian life. Though gross drunkenness never 
be exhibited, yet an appetite for alcohol may exist, pernicious to both body and 
soul. The lust for a little may be as truly sinful as the lust for a larger quantity. 



THE EPISTLE OF 

ST PAUL TO PHILEMON. 



Verses 12, 16. 



Whom I have sent again . . . receive .... Not now as a 
servant [slave]. 



In the United States, a few years ago, this text was a favorite argument for the 
toleration of slavery ; and the criticism employed might be exactly paralleled by 
the arguments of English divines in favor of strong drink. The claim for grati- 
tude and obedience made by God upon His people — and allowed in their triumphant 
songs — was for deliverance from slavery — deliverance from the house of bondage ; 
and the mission of our Lord was announced as that of opening the prison-doors 
that the oppressed might go free. Is it credible that the Christian apostle could 
mean to approve the institution of slavery ? Is it a correct inference that, because, 
in the then state of the world, when the people had no political power to wield, — 
when it would have been sheer madness to attempt to disturb the social frame- 
work of political despotism, — therefore Paul held that people, under constituted 
governments of their own, ought not to abate an infamous and inhuman system ? 
He was preaching another Gospel, which, however, held seminally in its principle 
the doom of all slaveries ; and even then, in the exhortation to Onesimus to exercise 
patience, Paul does not forget to teach Philemon that, in the light of Christianity, 
fraternity and fetters are incompatible. 

The principle is applicable to the question of drinking. No amount of historical 
permission can ever make the use of alcoholic liquor right. Every tree is known 
by its fruit, and the fruitage of drinking is evil, and that continually. 



THE GENERAL 

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 



Chapter XIII. Verse 16. 



But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such 
sacrifices God is well pleased. 



God is well-pleased with well-doing and almsgiving because He is Himself ever 
doing good and communicating blessings to his creatures; and in imitation of 
Him we should not forget to present Him with such sacrifices, — the most grateful 
and becoming that can be offered. We may conclude from this passage, that wise 
efforts — such as the Temperance Reform really is, for the prevention of poverty 
and suffering, — are well-pleasing to the Most High; for they seek the welfare 
of body, mind, and spirit, and they never fail to realize their ends whenever they 
are permitted to operate. In the offering of such sacrifices, all Christian churches 
and Christian professors would be most consistently engaged ; and if so employed, 
how immensely would the well-being of the human family be promoted ! 

John Wesley, in January, 1763, preached a sermon before the revived Society 
for the Reformation of Manners, in which he says, " For this end a few persons in 
London, toward the close of the last century, united together, and incredible good 
was done by them for near forty years. But then, most of the original members 
being gone to their reward, those who succeeded them grew faint in their mind 
and departed from the work, so that, a few years ago, the society ceased." As the 
formation of this society manifested true Christian zeal and virtue, and the falling 
away from its support evinced unfaithfulness and coldness; so to refuse to do 
almost ' incredible good ' in the cause of Temperance is to incur the condemnation 
of the text : " He who knowelh to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." 



THE 



GENERAL EPISTLE OF ST JAMES, 



Chapter I. Verses 13 — 15. 

13 Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God : for 
God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: 
14 But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, 
and enticed. 15 Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth 
sin : and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death. 



Obs. 1. As God cannot tempt men to evil, we may be fully assured that He 
cannot approve the use of that which is intrinsically an insidious temptation to evil, 
involving the ruin of millions of our species. Dr Thomas Reid, Professor of Moral 
Philosophy, nearly a century ago, pointed out the true causation of the drinker's 
lust and the drunkard's appetite: — "Besides the appetites which Nature hath 
given us, for useful and necessary purposes, we may create appetites which Nature 
never gave. The frequent use of things which stimulate the nervous system pro- 
duces a languor when their effect is gone off, and a desire to repeat them. By this 
means a desire of a certain object is created, accompanied by an uneasy sensation. 
Both are removed for a time by [the use of] the object desired; but they return 
after a certain interval. Such are the appetites which some men acquire for the 
use of tobacco, for opiates, and for intoxicating liquors " {Works, Hamilton's Ed., 
P- 553)- God creates no deceitful meats or drinks. 

2. As subjective temptation lies in human lust (i. e. illicit or ill-regulated desire 
of any degree), it becomes our plain and positive duty to avoid whatever stimulates 
this lust ; but who can name a stimulus to the chief vices of mankind comparable 
to intoxicating drink ? 

3. The craving for drink is most prolific in bringing forth sin, and of sin the 
issue is death, physical and moral, temporal and eternal. Strong drink is a 
deceitful but ceaseless destroyer ; and as every lust of the flesh finds in it its appro- 
priate fuel and fire, its aggregate influence on human seduction and ruin baffles 
alike calculation and conception. 



Chapter III. Verse 8. 



But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of 
deadly poison. 

An unruly evil] Akatascheton kakon, an 'uncoercible evil.' Codices Aleph, 
A, and B reads akatastaton kakon, 'a disorderly (or seditious) evil.' 



382 JAMES, IV. 17. 



It has been argued that "as the tongue is not to be cut out or unused, although 
it is so strongly denounced, therefore wine, though styled ' a mocker,' is not to be 
renounced." The reply is twofold: — 

1. That St James uses the word 'tongue' figuratively, and as the mere organ 
of that evil disposition which he describes as 'a deadly poison.' A child can 
perceive that the tongue — the physical instrument — is not meant, and that were it 
cut out the evil disposition would remain, and find expression another way. But 
when it is said 'wine is a mocker,' the figure does not lie in the 'wine' but in the 
word 'mocker,' the force of the figure consisting in the fact that wine itself, 
actually and directly, exerts an effect upon the drinker entitling it to the name of 
• mocker ' ; so that by the removal of the wine the whole of this effect must cease, 
and so much of sin and misery be spared. If instead of ' wine ' we should say 
'the cup is a mocker,' we should have a figure corresponding to the one in this 
text, as ' cup ' would stand in the same relation to ' wine ' which ' tongue ' holds to 
the 'evil heart,' whose venom it gives forth. Hence, — 

2. This text, rightly understood, carries with it a conclusion directly opposite to 
that of the objector; for as the 'poison ' complained of is not to be tolerated or 
tampered with, so neither is the wine whose quality is described in analogous 
terms. Get rid of the real moral agent — the bad disposition — and the tongue will 
become pure ; so get rid of the real physical agent — the wine — and the cup that 
contained it will be harmless. 



Chapter IV. Verse 17. 

Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to 
him it is sin. 



The original word translated ' good ' is kalon, ' beautiful ' = excellent ; and to 
him who knows what is suitable to be done, and does it not, the omission is 
counted as sin. (1) No positive act of evil is required— simply the neglect of what 
is good. The first and worst neglect of Men is the neglect of the Truth ; and it is 
now, as in the days of the Redeemer, the great condemnation, that though truth 
has come into the world, men love darkness rather than light. The first duty of 
man is truth-seeking, the second truth-doing. (2) No positive command is required, 
Divine or social ; it is enough that the act would have been excellent or useful to 
render the neglect, sin to the neglecter. (3) Knowledge is, of course, presupposed, 
for he who does not know what is kalon, cannot consciously do it ; but men are 
responsible for the possession of this knowledge, especially where it is easily attain- 
able. St Paul had said that "whatever is not of faith," i. e. is not done from a 
sense of right, "is sin"; and St James here presents the counterpart truth, that 
it is also sin to know what is morally loveable and not to do it. This principle 
effectually disposes of the objectors who refuse to recognize the duty of abstinence, 
unless an explicit and universal command can be shown for it! Others fondly 
think that so long as they do not ' admit ' the duty of abstinence, it is no duty to 
them! — as if idle 'opinions' could overrule the law of God! St James affirms a 
doctrine quite different from this. According to him, a perception of the excellence 
of abstinence— its suitableness and utility— constitutes a rule of duty which cannot 
be neglected without guilt. Much care and charity is called for in applying this rule 
to others, but «<?«-abstainers cannot be too candid and faithful in applying it to 
themselves. Nor will the plea of want of knowledge avail for the past, unless the 
ignorance has been unavoidable, without prejudice, and honest. 



THE FIRST 

GENERAL EPISTLE OF ST PETER. 



Chapter I. Verse 13. 

Wherefore gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to 
the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation 
of Jesus Christ. 



Be sober] Neephontes, 'being abstinent.' Codex B reads nephontes. The 
ancient tradition which identifies St Peter with the Nazarites, gives peculiar force 
to this use of neephontes ; as also does the figure employed — that of racers who 
brace themselves up to their task, and who, exercising a complete control over 
their appetites, hope on as they run, looking for the prize. In full accordance 
with this view are the injunctions against ' former lusts ' (ver. 14) ; to the practice 
of holiness and fear (ver. 15 — 17); the figure of 'a holy priesthood offering up 
spiritual sacrifices ' (chap. ii. 5); ' a royal priesthood' (ver. 9); and the warning 
against ' fleshly lusts which war against the soul ' (ver. 1 1). Why should Christians, 
as a race of priests, be found less careful than were the priests of Levi, who were 
forbidden to use wine and strong drink when in attendance in the temple, lest they 
should transgress and displease God? If fleshly lusts are to be avoided, what 
else but common wisdom is it to renounce their most subtle and dangerous excite- 
ment ? [ On the opposition of the neephonist soul to strong drink, see the quota- 
tion from Philo, in Note on I Thess. v. 6.] 



Chapter II. Verses 13, 14. 

13 Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's 
sake: whether it be to the king, as supreme; i 4 Or unto governors, 
as unto them that are sent by him for the punishment of evildoers, 
and for the praise of them that do well. 



If a parenthesis be placed before ' whether ' and after ' by him,' or even a comma 
after 'him,' a good sense will be realized, and the contradiction of the doctrine, 
that as to some ordinances (' idolatry,' to wit) we must ■ obey God rather than men,' 
will disappear. The word translated ' ordinance ' is literally ' creature ' {ktisis) ; 
but the context shows the absurdity of understanding it without limitation. Tested 
by the rule of this text (that the institution Christians must contentedly accept, is 



384 I PETER, IV. I — 5. 



one that represses evil-doing and encourages those citizens that do-well), the licensed 
liquor traffic must be condemned as a mistake on the part of Government, which 
frustrates the very end and aim of righteous law. The purpose of all social 
arrangements should be, as Mr Gladstone has hinted, to make it hard to do wrong 
and easy to do right. 



Chapter II. Verse 21. 



For even hereunto were ye called : because Christ also suffered for 
us, leaving us an example that ye should follow his steps. 



Example] Hupogrammos, ' a word-or-writing copy ' = pattern for imitation. 
This of course implies 'in like circumstances.' In John xiii. 15, we have 
hupodeigma, 'a sample set under' one's eyes for imitation or for warning, as the 
nature of the case or the context may determine. 



No passage has been more abused than this, when employed to justify the 
gratification of our lusts. Men need no solemn exhortations to induce them to do 
what is pleasant to the sensuous nature, but only to that which will mortify their 
pride or curb their appetites ; and in such connection, and for such ends, were 
these Divine injunctions given. 'Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an 
example,' — suffered patiently, piously, ungrudgingly, for you, that you might do 
the same for others. We are to think, feel, and walk as He did; observing 
His principles of self-denial, even where our circumstances may not be the same. 
"But," as Professor John Brown, D.D., pithily remarks, "His circumstances and 
ours are often very different ; so that an action which was right in Him might be 
wrong in us. Knowing the hearts of men, for example, he spoke to hypocrites in 
a way that it would be presumptuous in us to speak to any man. . . . We 
should err if we were to draw the conclusion that we ought to have as little to do 
with politics as Jesus Christ had ; for otir place, as citizens of a free commonwealth, 
is very different from His, who had no political standing at all in the existing 
forms of rule, whether Jewish or Roman." — 'Expository Discourses,' x.) Our 
Lord had a higher mission than seeking mere political reform by a hopeless local* 
agitation, for instance, against the corruptions and outrages of the slave-system 
then prevalent. In this respect He was no 'example' to Englishmen and 
Americans, who, having by Providence been invested with political influence and 
privileges, have righteously combined and organized their power for the total 
overthrow of the 'sum of all villanies,' thereby paving the way for the possible 
practice of Christ's law of universal brotherhood. 



Chapter IV. Verses i — 5. 

1 Forasmuch then as Christ hath suffered for us in the flesh, arm 
yourselves likewise with the same mind : for he that hath suffered in 
the flesh hath ceased from sin ; 2 That he no longer should live the 
rest of his time in the flesh to the lusts of men, but to the will of God. 
3 For the time past of our life may suffice us to have wrought the 
will of the Gentiles, when we walked in lasciviousness, lusts, 



I PETER, IV. 7. 385 



excess of wine, revellings, banquetings, and abominable idolatries : 
4 Wherein they think it strange that ye run not with them to the same 
excess of riot, speaking evil of you : 5 Who shall give account to him 
that is ready to judge the quick and the dead. 



V. 3. Excess of wine] Oinopklugiais, 'vinous excesses.' Codex B reads 
oinophlugiois, and Codex Aleph (firsthand) has oinophrugiois, probably a copyist's 
error. 

Revellings] Kbmois, 'debaucheries,' the rioting and immoralities consequent 
on indulgence in wine. 

Banquetings] Potois, ' drinkings ' = drinking-matches, social tippling. Per- 
haps no better English equivalent could be suggested than 'wine-parties,' — a name 
given to certain social gatherings very frequent among the undergraduates of our 
national universities. 

V. 4. The same excess of riot] Teen auteen tees asotias anachusin, ' the same 
outpouring (redundancy) of dissoluteness.' Asdtia, translated 'excess' in Ephes. 
v. 18, is here rendered 'riot.' Anachusis signifies the act of emptying out, as of a 
river pouring itself into the sea. 



1. The apostle, in the above passage, draws a dark picture of the times, but the 
testimony of contemporary writers corroborates its truth. The profligacy of the 
Gentile world was boundless, and associated in all its exercises with the intoxicating 
liquors then in use. [See the testimony of Pliny and Philo in the Note on Gal. 
v. 19 — 21.] 

2. That separation from all drinking associations which Christianity rendered 
imperative, would go far to secure a state of sobriety little short of that now con- 
nected with the Temperance movement ; and the spirit of this passage favors the 
use of all expedients by which the blot of intemperance may be expunged or — 
better still — averted. The surprise of the heathen that Christians did not exhibit 
' the same ' profusion of ruinous depravity as themselves, is not to be regarded as 
an admission that some profligacy was practiced by true Christians, or permitted by 
their religion. Because excess in vice was interdicted, no inference in favor of 
any indulgence in what was evil or dangerous could be properly drawn by them 
or by us. The flagon may be denounced as a curse without an implicit approval 
of the glass as being good or safe. 



Chapter IV. Verse 7. 

But the end of all things is at hand : be ye therefore sober, and 
watch unto prayer. 



Be ye therefore sober] Sophroneesate oun, 'be ye sober-minded, therefore.' 
And watch unto prayer] Kai neepsate eis tas proseuchas, ' and be abstinent 
in order to the prayers.' Codices Aleph, A, and B omit the tas, 'the,' before 
proseuchas, 'prayers.' That neepsate is here to be taken to refer to physical 
sobriety, is probable from its association with sophronizo, denoting mental sobriety 
and from the natural antithesis of such a state to the vices depicted in ver. 3. 
Bishop Jebb considers ' watching unto prayer ' as = ' vigilantly guarding against 
whatever is unfriendly to devotion ' ; and the term selected (drink not), upon the 
49 



386 I PETER, V. 8. 



face of it, suggests that ' strong drink ' is specially unfriendly, by destroying watch- 
fulness. "The language," says Dr John Brown, "is peculiar. First, what is 
meant by watching ? In the original signification it refers to a physical state of 
the body and mind rather than to a moral state of the mind. It is descriptive of 
that state in which all the faculties are awake and active." This, of course, is the 
fit state for watching. Hence Sir B. Brodie, in his ' Psychological Inquiries,' lays 
it down as a law, that night-nurses should abstain from the narcotic alcohol. And 
it hardly needs argument to show that what antagonizes physical alertness, and 
dims the physical eyes, is altogether incompatible with spiritual sensibility and 
moral watchfulness, the conditions of enlightened, true, and acceptable prayer. 
Wine, ' that tends to drowsiness in the brain,' cannot promote vigilance and piety 
in the soul. If neepho is thought to be used frequently in the sense of ' to be calm, 
cool, self-collected,' there is an implied reference to the state of body and mind 
consequent on abstinence from exciting drinks. The passage may be paraphrased, 
"The end of all things draws near; therefore be sober in mind and abstemious 
in life, in order that you may be the better able to engage in the exercises of devo- 
tion suitable to so solemn a crisis." [As to neepho, see Note on I Thess. v. 6 — 8.] 



Chapter V. Verse 8. 



Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a 
roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour. 



Be sober] Neepsate, ' be abstinent. ' The English translators here render by 
' be sober ' the word they had rendered (chap. iv. 7) ' watch. ' 

Be VIGILANT] Greegoreesate, 'be wakeful.' This corresponds to the language 
of St Paul (i Thess. v. 6), ' let us watch (greegoromen) and be sober (neephomen) y ; 
and though the order is different, the sense is the same. St Paul mentions mental 
wakefulness, and then abstemiousness as the physical condition of it; St Peter first 
names the physical condition, and then the mental result. 

For your adversary] Antidikos, 'accuser,' a legal term originally applied to 
the plaintiff in a suit. 

The devil] Diabolos, 'devil,' the tempter and calumniator of the good. 

Seeking whom he may devour] Zeelon Una kalapiee, ' seeking whom he 
may swallow (drink) down.' The contrast between neepsate (from nee pino, 'not 
to drink') and katapiee (from katapino, 'to drink down') has not escaped the 
observation of Dr Adam Clarke, who thus comments: — "It is not every one that 
he can swallow down. Those who are sober and vigilant are proof against him ; 
these he may not swallow down. Those who are drunk with the cares of this 
world, and are unwatchful, these he may swallow down. There is a beauty in this 
verse, and striking apposition between the first and last words, which I think have 
not been noticed ; — Be sober, neepsate, from nee, not, and piein, to drink — do not 
swallow down — and the word katapiee, from kata, down, and piein, to drink. If 
you swallow strong drink down, the devil will swallow you down. Hear this, ye 
drunkards, topers, tipplers, or by whatsoever name ye are known in society, or 
among your fellow-sinners, strong drink is not only your way to the devil, but the 
devil's way into you. Ye are such as the devil particularly may swallow down." 



I PETER, V. 8. 387 



Professor John Brown, D.D., in his ' Discourses on the First Epistle of St Peter,' 
confirms this interpretation of neepsate : — "Its proper signification is ' to be absti- 
nent,' etc. The word may be understood either literally or figuratively. If 
literally, we are here taught that temperance is necessary, in order to our resisting 
the devil. And, certainly, nothing can be more obviously true. The natural 
tendency of intoxicating drinks is to diminish the power of conscience and reason, 
and to increase the power of the lower principles of our nature, animal appetite and 
irascible feeling. It increases the strength of what needs to be restrained, and 
weakens the strength of what is fitted and intended to restrain. While this is 
undoubtedly true, and highly important, [yet] as the corresponding [rather, con- 
sequential] term, 'be vigilant,' is plainly to be understood in a figurative sense, we 
apprehend the expression before us must also be interpreted figuratively; an inter- 
pretation which substantially includes the literal meaning, while it includes much 
more" (hi. p. 356). This is certainly an oversight on the part of the Professor, 
since there is no canon of criticism to compel all words in a sentence to be under- 
stood collectively in a literal, or collectively in a metaphorical sense ; and it is here 
quite plain that physical intoxication does induce moral narcotism. Indeed, it is 
not clear what ' figurative ' temperance can mean in this connection. 



THE SECOND 

GENERAL EPISTLE OF ST PETER. 



Chapter I. Verse 6. 



And to knowledge temperance ; and to temperance patience ; and 
to patience godliness. 



Temperance] Enkrateian, 'self-restraint' (/. e. as to the appetites). The 
Vulgate has abstinentia, which is also followed by Wiclif, ' abstynence. ' Tyndale 
has 'temperancy.' As to enkrateia, see Notes on Acts xxiv. 25, 1 Cor. ix. 25, and 
Gal. v. 25. 



The whole paragraph (ver. 5 — 8) is a beautiful figure drawn from the ancient 
choral dance. The question whether the order of the graces here enumerated is 
accidental, has been generally answered in the negative, though there is some 
difference of opinion as to the purpose of the apostle in the arrangement as it 
stands. Some have sought the key in the tendency of one grace to induce the next 
in succession — the tendency of true 'faith' to produce 'virtue,' i.e. moral courage, 
of virtue to induce 'knowledge,' and of knowledge to beget 'temperance,' etc.; 
while others, with perhaps more insight, have sought the clue of connection in the 
necessity of so conjoining one grace with another, that a certain tendency to excess 
may be arrested ; as if the apostle had said, " In order that faith may not indispose 
to active effort, add to it moral vigor; and lest acts of daring absorb you, add to 
them knowledge; and lest knowledge render you careless of a pure morality, 
exercise self-restraint over bodily desires ; and lest physical continence make you 
too self-regarding, add to it patience " — the subjective and objective being so united 
as to prevent an undue preponderance of either. The importance attached to 
1 temperance ' in the great code of Christian ethics cannot be denied ; and experience 
has proved that the spirit of temperance cannot be more wisely exemplified than 
in promoting abstinence from intoxicating drinks. Knowledge, when sufficiently 
comprehensive, prompts to this course ; and temperajice, so exhibited, is followed 
by practical benefits, which knowledge in itself cannot impart, and is a guard 
against evils from which knowledge in the abstract cannot protect. Many are the 
warning examples of men who have vainly trusted in ' knowledge ' and intellect to 
save them from the insidious and ensnaring influence of strong drink. 



THE BOOK OF 



THE REVELATION OF ST JOHN. 



Chapter II. Verse 14. 

But I have a few things against thee, because thou hast there them 
that hold the doctrine of Balaam, who taught Balak to cast a 
stumblingblock before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed 
unto idols, and to commit fornication. 



The sin of Balaam consisted in his accursed love of filthy lucre, which led him 
to suggest to Balak certain means of tempting Israel to sin. But the Divine 
punishment fell not only on the guilty Moabites, but on the still more guilty 
prophet. The ' wages of unrighteousness ' proved his destruction. Is it not 
to be deeply deplored that, for Mammon's sake, tens of thousands of men are 
found in our professedly Christian land to set before their neighbors a snare in the 
form of temptations to indulgence in intoxicating liquors, by which every kind of 
disease and lust is generated or inflamed ? And though the Government tax on 
these liquors may be regarded as a restriction upon their use, the effect of the tax, 
in adding to the revenue, is demoralizing to the State. This was perceived by the 
Rev. John Wesley, who, in his 'Thoughts on Scarcity,' published in 1773, after 
characterizing ardent spirit as ' poison that destroys not only the strength of life, 
but also the morals of our countrymen,' exclaimed, " Oh, tell it not in Constantinople 
that the English raise the royal revenue by selling the flesh and blood of their 
countrymen." 

Chapter VI. Verse 6. 

And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure 
of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny ; and 
see thou hurt not the oil and the wine. 



The oil and the wine] To elaion kai ton oinon, 'the oil and the wine.' 
Hence both oil and wine seem put for the solid fruits, the olive and the grape 
yielding the fluid oil and oinon, if, indeed, the olive tree and vine be not intended. 
Wetstein gives, as an illustration of this phraseology, an extract from Cicero's 
Natura Deorum (ii. 12) : — Quid de vitibus olivetisque dicam, quorum uberrimi 
lactissimique fructus nihil omnino ad bestias pertinent ? — ' What shall I say of vines 
and olive trees, whose richest and juciest fruits are not the least adapted to the 



390 REVELATION, VIII. IO, II. 

beasts ?' The notion that Mohammedanism is intolerant of the vine is a Western 
view, though sanctioned by so recent and generally excellent a witness as Dean 
Stanley, who says, in his * Palestine and Sinai,' p. 421, speaking of the vine, that 
Christians and Jews alone ' can properly cultivate what is to Mussulmans a for- 
bidden fruit ' ; whereas Mohammed, in the Koran, chap. 16, expressly distinguishes 
between the natural produce of the vine and the artificial preparations of the wine- 
maker : — " We give you to drink pure milk, which is swallowed with pleasure by 
those who drink it. And of the fruits of palm trees and of grapes ye obtain an 
inebriating liquor, and also good nourishment;" on which Sale remarks, "Not 
only wine, which is forbidden, but also lawful food, as dates, raisins, a kind of 
honey flowing from the dates, and vinegar." 



Chapter VIII. Verses 10, 11. 

10 And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from 
heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of 
the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters; n And the name of the 
star is called Wormwood : and the third part of the waters became 
wormwood : and many men died of the waters, because they were 
made bitter. 



V. 11. Wormwood] Ho apsinthos. Dr Alford, in his Note on this passage, 
offers the following remarks : — "It is hardly possible to read of this third plague 
and not to think of the deadly effect of these strong spirituous drinks, which are, in 
fact, water turned into poison. The very name absinthe is not unknown in their 
nomenclature, and there is no effect which could be more aptly described by the 
falling of fire into water as this which results in ardent spirit, in that which the 
simple islanders of the South Sea call fire-water. That this plague may go on to 
destroy even this fearful proportion of the ungodly [a third] in the latter days, is 
far from impossible, considering its prevalence, even now, in some parts of the 
civilized world. But I mention this rather as an illustration than as an interpreta- 
tion." It is a curious coincidence that the most deadly form of ardent spirit yet 
manufactured in Europe — a veritable ' poisoned poison ' — is called absinthe. It is 
of a green color, and, when not adulterated with copper, derives its peculiar hue 
and bitter taste from a vegetable production.* The observations of Dean Alford 
do him credit as evincing a feeling appreciation of the ravages of ardent spirit ; but 
he can scarcely have been ignorant that similar havoc has been caused by other 
forms of inebriating liquor. He is pleased to term distilled spirit ' water turned 
into poison,' yet (strange inconsistency) the poisonous element in distilled spirit is 
identical with the intoxicating agent which, according to the Dean, the Lord 
directly infused into the water at the Cana wedding-feast, and thereby converted it 
into wine ! In ardent spirit the alcohol formed by fermentation is not so diluted 
as in fermented drinks, but chemically it is the same, and operates physiologically 
in an exactly similar way. Very much also of the ardent spirit consumed as grog, 
punch, and spirits-and-water, is possessed of an alcoholic potency much less than 
that of the ports and sherries in fashionable use. 



* The chief seat of its manufacture is amongst the Jura mountains, the agents being monks, who 
derive an immense revenue from its sale. 



REVELATION, XIV. 8, 10, 1 8 — 20. 39 1 

Chapter XIV. Verse 8. 

And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is 
fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine 
of the wrath of her fornication. 



Of the wine of the wrath of her fornication] Ek tou oinou tou 
thumou tees porneias autees, 'from the wine of the heat [or passion] of her forni- 
cation. ' 

The Christian seer (like the elder prophets of Judaism) employs intoxicating 
wine as a striking symbol of spiritual iniquity.* By thumos here is, probably, not 
to be understood 'wrath,' since 'the wine of fornication' is not productive of 
anger, but of furious illicit desire. Both ' rage ' and ' passion ' have in English 
the sense of mental excitement, taking the form either of anger or vehement 
desire. If thumos is interpreted in the sense of 'wrath,' the meaning must be 
that the ' fornication ' spoken of is a means of provoking the wrath of God as dis- 
played in his punitive dispensations. 



Chapter XIV. Verse 10. 

The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is 
poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation ; and he 
shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy 
angels, and in the presence of the Lamb. 

Of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without 
mixture] Ek tou oinou tou thumou tou Theou, tou kekerasmenoti akratou, 'from 
the wine, mingled, unmixed (undiluted), of the wrath of God.' 

The English translators have missed the true sense and force of the original, 
for the wine is kekerasmenon, 'mixed' {not 'poured out'); and also akraton, 
* unmixed ' — that is, it is mixed with powerful drugs to render it more heady, but 
' unmixed ' with water by which its potency would be reduced. This verbal 
paradox imparts to the description a startling vividness and lurid glow. [See Note 
on Isa. lxiii. 6.] 



Chapter XIV. Verses 18- 



18 And another angel came out from the altar, which had power 
over fire ; and cried with a loud cry to him that had the sharp sickle, 
saying, Thrust in thy sharp sickle, and gather the clusters of the vine 
of the earth; for her grapes are fully ripe. 19 And the angel thrust 
in his sickle into the earth, and gathered the vine of the earth, and 
cast it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. 20 And the 
winepress was trodden without the city, and blood came out of the 
winepress, even unto the horse bridles, by the space of a thousand 
and six hundred furlongs. 

* Benson, following Bishop Newton, has this comment : " The wine 0/ her wrath— or rather, ' of 
the inflaming wine ' of her fornication. Hers was a kind of circean cup, with poisoned liquor to 
intoxicate and inflame mankind to spiritual fornication. St John, in these figures, copies the ancient 
prophets." 



392 REVELATION, XVII. I, 2. 

V. 1 8. And gather the clusters of the vine of the earth] Kai trugeeson 
tous botruas tees ampelou tees gees, * and pick the grapes (or grape-clusters) of the 
vine of the earth.' 

For her grapes are fully ripe] Hoti eekmasan ai staphulai autees, ' because 
her grapes are perfectly ripe.' 

V. 19. And gathered the vine of the earth] Kai etrugeese teen ampelon 
tees gees, ' and picked the vine of the earth.' The principal MSS. read tees ampe- 
lou, 'of the vine.' 

The great winepress of the wrath of God] Teen leenon tou thumou tou 
Theou teen megaleen, * the press, the great (one) of the wrath of God. ' 

V. 20. The winepress . . out of the winepress] Hee leenos . . ek 
tees leenou. 



This descriptive imagery closely resembles that employed in Joel iii. 13. The 
vine of the earth represents earthly-minded corrupt human nature ; and this vine 
is stripped of its fruit, — viz. the evil-hearted of our race, who are cast into ' the 
press of the Divine wrath,' so called because the wrath of God causes it to be 
trodden, — a figure of the penal afflictions which Divine Providence will bring upon 
the incorrigibly guilty. 



Chapter XVI. Verse 19. 

And the great city was divided into three parts, and the cities of 
the nations fell: and great Babylon came in remembrance before 
God, to give unto her the cup of the wine of the fierceness of his 
wrath. 



The cup of the wine of the fierceness of his wrath] To poteerion tou 
oinou tou thumou tees orgees autou. 



This metaphor differs from that presented in chap. xiv. 18 — 20, for here the 
' fierceness of the wrath ' of God is described under the image of a cup of wine, 
intoxicating and maddening to those who are compelled to drink it up. [See 
Notes on Psa. lxxv. 8; Isa. li. 17, 22; Jer. xiii. 12, 13; Ezek. xxiii. 31 — 34.] 



Chapter XVII. Verses i, 2. 

1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven 
vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither ; I will shew 
unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many 
waters : 2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornica- 
tion, and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the 
wine of her fornication. 



V. 2. Have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication] 
Emethustheesan ek tou oinou tees porneias autees, * have been made drunk (made 
themselves drunk) from the wine of her fornication.' 



REVELATION, XIX. 1 5. 393 

Spiritual whoredom is represented as 'wine' made enticing to the taste, but 
possessed of a terrible power to confuse the understanding and corrupt the heart. 



Chapter XVII. Verse 6. 

And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and 
with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus : and when I saw her, I won- 
dered with great admiration. 



Drunken] Methuousan, ' drunk '= filled to the full = gorged. The meaning 
of methud here is clearly one of fulness or satiety, as the ' blood of saints and mar- 
tyrs ' could not be supposed to cause even metaphorical intoxication. 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 3. 

For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornica- 
tion, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, 
and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance 
of her delicacies. 



Of the wine of the wrath of her fornication] Ek tou oinou tou thumou 
tees porneias autees. Codices A and B omit tou oinou, ' of the wine ' ; and Codex C 
reads, ek tees porneias tou thumou autees, 'of the fornication of her wrath.' If the 
A. V. is held to be correct, the term 'wrath' must be regarded as applied 
to the cup of fornication prophetically, indicating the consequences which its 
reception should involve. [See Note on chap. xiv. 8.] 



Chapter XVIII. Verse 13. 

And cinnamon, and odors, and ointments, and frankincense, and 
wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts and sheep, and 
horses, and chariots, and slaves, and souls of men. 



And wine] Kai oinon. Here natural and artificial things are all commingled. 



Chapter XIX. Verse 15. 

And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should 
smite the nations : and he shall rule them with a rod of iron : and he 
treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. 



And he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of 
Almighty God] Kai autos patei teen leenon tou oinou tou thumou tees orgees tou 
Theou tou pantokratoros, ' and he treadeth the press of the wine of the fierceness 
and of the wrath of the Almighty God.' [See Note on chap. xiv. 18 — 20.] 
50 



394 REVELATION, XXII. 1 7. 

Chapter XXII. Verse 17. 

And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth 
say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, 
let him take the water of life freely. 



The water of life] Ho kudor zoees, 'the water of life '= the living water. 
As the terrestrial paradise was supplied with ' a river that went out of Eden to 
water it' (Gen. ii. 10), so the vision of the celestial paradise (Rev. xxii. 1) pre- 
sents the enchanting spectacle of "a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, 
proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb " ; and it is of this 'living 
water ' — the unpolluted and peerless Truth of God — that the children of men are 
now invited to drink, that they may desire those richer and deeper draughts which 
heaven will yield. It is not without an instructive design that ' water ' receives the 
denomination ' living, ' for what of life would remain on earth were water to be 
banished from it ? And it is not less significant that the Holy Spirit employs the 
' living water ' of earth to typify the truth by which the life of all redeemed and 
happy souls is sustained for evermore. Contrasting such an emblem with the 
inspired allusions to intoxicating wine, as symbolic of moral seduction, corruption, 
and infatuation on the one hand, and Divine indignation and retribution on the 
other, we shall have ourselves alone to blame if we mistake the place that ought 
to be assigned in our own judgment to these material hieroglyphs of moral and 
spiritual realities. To prize and use with thankfulness suck water, and to reject 
with resolution suck wine, cannot be other than the dictate of the wisdom from 
above 'which is profitable to direct,' and concerning which it is said, 'Her ways 
are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.' Such 'wisdom is ever 
justified of her children'; and in the numberless benefits, personal and social, 
physical and moral, which have resulted from a faithful adherence to the true 
Temperance principle of 'abstinence from all that can intoxicate,' the Divine 
benediction is to be traced as clearly as in the great natural processes whereby the 
1 face of the earth ' is renewed from year to year. Pure, life-giving water is the 
representative of the Temperance Reformation, as alcoholic, life-impairing wine is 
of the drinking customs of society; and as are the representatives, so are the 
effects ; and as are the effects, so should be the choice of all men and women who 
delight in purity, who love mankind, and who seek to worship God ' in spirit and 
in truth.' 

" Wine, like man its maker, flows, 

Mirth mixed up with many woes ; 

But Water, made by Him above, 

For ever flows a stream of Love." 



APPENDICES 



The impartial reader is respectfully apprised, that in the Notes of the Commentary every known, 
it is believed almost every possible, critical Objection, has been answered by anticipation, thus doing 
away with the need for formal and unpleasant controversy. An uncritical and suicidal article against 
some of the positions of Dr Lees— founded on partial citation of his writings— has appeared in the 
Bibliotheca Sacra, and been reprinted in an Irish (so-called religious) magazine, which has refused 
the correction of its errors and inconsistencies. Our last Appendix, however, supplies ample material 
of refutation. In reply to the vicious insinuation that the temperance proclivities of Dr Lees have 
warped his critical judgment, we need only say that the temperance cause would be better sustained 
by viewing tirosk as a species of yayin. We, however, cannot sacrifice principle to party zeal or 
personal inclinations : with us Truth is every thing, or nothing. 



APPENDIX A. 



A SELECTION OF SCRIPTURE TEXTS, 

EXHIBITING THE AUTHORIZED ENGLISH VERSION WITH SUGGESTED 
EMENDATIONS. 



[Of the passages considered in this Commentary, the following are the principal 
concerning which it is believed that a Revised Rendering is desirable. The 
reason for each version will be found in the Notes upon each Text respec- 
tively. The words in parentheses are designed to convey the full sense of the 
original terms. ] 



L— THE OLD TESTAMENT. 

Authorized Version. Proposed Rendering. 

Genesis 9. 20. And Noah began to And Noah began to be a cultivator of 

be an husbandman, and he planted a the soil, and he prepared a vineyard, 

vineyard : 21. And he drank of the And he drank of the juice-of-the-grape, 

wine, and was drunken ; and he was and was filled to repletion ; and he was 

uncovered within his tent. uncovered within his tent. 



27. 28. Therefore God give thee of Therefore God give thee of the dew 
the dew of heaven, and the fatness of of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, 
the earth, and plenty of corn and wine. even abundance of corn and vine-fruit. 



27. 37. And Isaac answered and said And Isaac answered and said unto 
unto Esau, Behold, with corn and wine Esau, Behold, with corn and vine-fruit 
have I sustained him. have I sustained him. 



35. 14. And he (Jacob) poured a drink And he (Jacob) poured a libation 
offering thereon. thereon. 

[N. B. — In all other places where 'drink-offering' occurs in the A. V., the 
proper translation is ' libation ' — i. e. the pouring out of some liquid. ] 



398 



APPENDIX A. 



40. 9. And the chief butler told his 
dream to Joseph, and said to him, In 
my dream, behold, a vine was before 
me; 10. And in the vine were three 
branches : and it was as though it bud- 
ded, and her blossoms shot forth; and 
the clusters thereof brought forth ripe 
grapes. 



And the chief cup-bearer told his 
dream to Joseph, and said to him, In 
my dream, behold a vine was before 
me. And in the vine were three bran- 
ches, and the vine was upon the point 
of budding; (then) it burst into flower; 
(then) its stalk-clusters ripened into 
grapes (fit for gathering). 



43. II. And a little honey. 



And a little grape-honey. 



43. 44. And they (the brethren) drank, 
and were merry with him (Joseph). 



And they drank, and were well filled 
with him. 



49. 11. Binding his foal unto the vine, 
and his ass's colt unto the choice vine ; 
he washed his garments in wine, and his 
clothes in the blood of grapes : 12. His 
eyes shall be red with wine, and his 
teeth white with milk. 



Binding his foal to a vine, and his 
ass's colt to a sorek-vine, he shall wash 
his garments in wine and his clothes in 
the blood of grapes. His eyes shall be 
purple-stained with wine, and his teeth 
white with milk. 



And they shall eat the flesh in that 
night, roasted with fire, and sweet (=un- 
fermented) cakes. Seven days shall ye 
eat unfermented cakes ; even the first 
day ye shall put away ferment (what- 
ever-can-cause-fermentation) out of your 
houses : for whosoever eateth what is 
fermented from the first day until the 
seventh day, that soul shall be cut off 
from Israel. And ye shall attend to the 
unleavened, cakes. In the first month, 
on the fourteenth day of the month at 
even, ye shall eat unleavened cakes until 
the one and twentieth day of the month 
at even. Seven days shall there be no 
ferment found in your houses; and 
every one eating a fermented thing, even 
that soul shall be cut off from the con- 
gregation of Israel, whether he be a 
stranger, or born in the land. Ye shall 
eat nothing that has been fermented ; in 
all your habitations shall ye eat unfer- 
mented cakes. 

[N.B. — In all other places where the A. V. gives 'unleavened bread,' 'leaven,' 
'leavened bread,' and 'that which is leavened,' the preferable readings are — 
'unfermented cakes,' 'ferment,' 'fermented cakes,' and 'that which is fer- 
mented.'] 



Exodus 12. 8. And they shall eat the 
flesh in that night, roast with fire, and 
unleavened bread. 15. Seven days shall 
ye eat unleavened bread ; even the first 
day ye shall put away leaven out of your 
houses : for whosoever eateth leavened 
bread from the first day until the seventh 
day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel. 
17. And ye shall observe the feast of 
unleavened bread. 18. In the first 
month, on the fourteenth day of the 
month at even, ye shall eat unleavened 
bread, until the one and twentieth day 
of the month at even. 19. Seven days 
shall there be no leaven found in your 
houses : for whosoever eateth that which 
is leavened, even that soul shall be cut 
off from the congregation of Israel, 
whether he be a stranger, or born in the 
land. 20. Ye shall eat nothing leavened; 
in all your habitations shall ye eat un- 
leavened bread. 



Numbers 18. 12. All the best of the 
oil, and all the best of the wine, and of 
the wheat, the firstfruits of them which 
they shall offer unto the Lord, them 
have I given thee. 



All the choice part of the olive-and- 
orchard-fruit, and all the choice part of 
the vine-fruit, and of the corn ; the first- 
fruits of them which they shall offer unto 
the Lord, them have I given thee. 



APPENDIX A. 



399 



28. 7. And the drink offering thereof 
shall be the fourth part of an hin for the 
one lamb : in the holy place shalt thou 
cause the strong wine to be poured unto 
the Lord for a drink offering. 



And the libation thereof shall be the 
fourth part of a hin for the one lamb : in 
the holy place shalt thou cause the sweet 
drink to be poured out unto the Lord 
for a libation. 



Deuteronomy 7. 13. And he will 
love thee, and bless thee, and multiply 
thee : he will also bless the fruit of thy 
womb, and the fruit of thy land, thy 
corn, and thy wine, and thine oil, the 
increase of thy kine, and the flocks of 
thy sheep, in the land which he sware 
unto thy fathers to give thee. 



And he will love thee, and bless thee, 
and multiply thee : he will also bless the 
fruit of thy womb, and the fruit of thy 
land, thy corn, and thy vine-fruit, and 
thine olive-and-orchard-fruit, the in- 
crease of thy kine, and the flocks of thy 
sheep, in the land which he sware unto 
thy fathers to give thee. 



11. 14. That I will give you the rain 
of your land in his due season, the first 
rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest 
gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and 
thine oil. 



That I will give you the rain of your 
land in his due season, the first rain and 
the latter rain, that thou mayest gather 
in thy corn, and thy vine-fruit, and thine 
olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



12. 17. Thou mayest not eat within 
thy gates the tithe of thy corn, or of thy 
wine, or of thy oil. 



Thou mayest not eat within thy gates 
the tithe of thy corn, or of thy vine-fruit, 
or of thine olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



14. 23. And thou shalt eat before the 
Lord thy God, in the place which he 
shall choose to place his name there, the 
tithe of thy corn, of thy wine, and of 
thine oil. 



And thou shalt eat before the Lord 
thy God, in the place which he shall 
choose to place his name there, the tithe 
of thy corn, of thy vine-fruit, and of thine 
olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



14. 26. And thou shalt bestow that 
money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth 
after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, 
or for strong drink, or for whatsoever 
thy soul desireth: and thou shalt eat 
there before the Lord thy God, and thou 
shalt rejoice, thou, and thine household. 



And thou shalt bestow that money for 
whatsoever thy soul loveth, for oxen, or 
for sheep, or for wine, or for sweet-drink, 
or for whatsoever thy soul desireth : and 
thou shalt eat there before the Lord thy 
God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou, and 
thine household. 



16. 13. Thou shalt observe the feast 
of tabernacles seven days, after that thou 
hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine. 



Thou shalt observe the feast of taber- 
nacles seven days, with thy gathering 
from thy threshing-floor and thy wine 
press. 



18. 4. The firstfruit also of thy corn, 
of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the 
first of the fleece of thy sheep, shalt thou 
give him. 



The firstfruit also of thy corn, of thy 
vine-fruit, and of thine olive-and-orchard- 
fruit, and the first of the fleece of thy 
sheep, shalt thou give him. 



21. 20. 

drunkard. 



He is a glutton and a He is a profligate and a toper. 



400 



APPENDIX A. 



28. 51. And he shall eat the fruit of 
thy cattle, and the fruit of thy land, 
until thou be destroyed : which also shall 
not leave thee either corn, wine, or oil, 
or the increase of thy kine, or flocks of 
thy sheep, until he have destroyed thee. 



And he shall eat the fruit of thy cattle, 
and the fruit of thy land, until thou be 
destroyed ; who also shall not leave thee 
either corn, vine-fruit, or olive-and-or- 
chard-fruit, or the increase of thy kine, 
or flocks of thy sheep, until he have 
destroyed thee. 



32. 14. And thou didst drink the pure 
blood of the grape. 



And the fresh-foaming blood of the 
grape thou shalt drink. 



32. 32. For their vine is of the vine of 
Sodom, and of the fields of Gomorrah : 
their grapes are grapes of gall, their 
clusters are bitter : 33. Their wine is 
the poison of dragons, and the cruel 
venom of asps. 



For the vine of Sodom is their vine, 
and of the fields of Gomorrah : their 
grapes are grapes of gall, their clustered- 
branches are bitter to them : the poison 
of serpents is their wine, and the viru- 
lent gall of vipers. 



32. 42. I will make mine arrows drunk 
with blood, and my sword shall devour 
flesh. 



I will soak my arrows in blood, and 
my sword shall devour flesh. 



33. 28. Israel then shall dwell in 
safety alone: the fountain of Jacob shall 
be upon a land of corn and wine ; also 
his heavens shall drop down dew. 



Israel then shall dwell in safety alone : 
the eye (= blessing) of (the God of) Jacob 
shall be upon a land of corn and vine- 
fruit ; also his heavens shall drop down 
dew. 



Judges 9. 13. And the vine said unto 
them, Should I leave my wine, which 
cheereth God and man, and go to be 
promoted over the trees ? 



2 Samuel 6. 19. And he dealt to 
every one a cake of bread, and a good 
piece of flesh, and a flagon of wine. 



2 Kings 18. 32. Until I come and 
take you away to a land like your own 
land, a land of corn and wine, a land of 
bread and vineyards, a land of oil olive 
and of honey, that ye may live, and not 
die. 



And the vine said unto them, Should 
I leave my grape-fruit, which gladdens 
gods and men, and go to be promoted 
over the trees ? 



And he dealt to every one a cake of 
bread, and a good piece of flesh, and a 
raisin-cake. 



Until I come and take you away to a 
land like your own land, a land of corn 
and vine-fruit, a land of bread and vine- 
yards, a land of the olive tree, of orchard- 
fruit, and of honey, that ye may live, and 
not die. 



1 Chronicles 16. 13. And he dealt 
to every one a loaf of bread, and a good 
piece of flesh, and a flagon of wine. 



And he dealt to every one a loaf of 
bread, and a good piece of flesh, and a 
raisin-cake. 



2 Chronicles 31. 5. The firstfruits 
of corn, wine, and oil, and honey. 



32. 28. Storehouses also for the 
crease of corn, and wine, and oil. 



The firstfruits of corn, vine-fruit, olive- 
and-orchard-fruit, and honey. 



Storehouses also for the increase of 
corn, and vine-fruit, and olive-and- 
orchard-fruit. 



APPENDIX A. 



401 



Nehemiah 5. n. Also the hundreth Also the hundreth part of the money, 
part of the money, and of the corn, the and of the corn, the vine-fruit, and the 
wine, and the oil, that ye exact of them, olive-and-orchard-fruit that ye exact of 

them. 



10. 37. And the fruit of all manner 
of trees, of wine, and of oil. 



And the fruit of all manner of trees, 
of vine-fruit, and of olive-and-orchard- 
fruit. 



10. 39. The offering of the corn, of 
the new wine, and the oil. 



The offering of the corn, of the vine- 
fruit, and the olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



13. 5. And the tithes of the corn, the 
new wine, and the oil. 



And the tithes of the corn, the vine- 
fruit, and the olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



13. 12. Then brought all Judah the 
tithe of the corn and the new wine and 
the oil unto the treasuries. 



Then brought all Judah the tithe of 
the corn and the vine-fruit and the olive- 
and-orchard fruit unto the storehouses. 



Job 12. 25. They grope in the dark 
without light, and he maketh them to 
stagger like a drunken man. 



They grope in the dark without light, 
and he causeth them to stray like one 
drunk. 



32. 19. Behold, my belly is as wine 
which hath no vent ; it is ready to burst 
like new bottles. 



Behold, my belly, like wine, has no 
vent ; like new bottles it is rent. 



Psalm 4. 7. Thou hast put gladness 
in my heart, more than in the time that 
their corn and their wine increased. 



Thou hast put gladness in my heart, 
more than when their corn and vine-fruit 
abounded. 



16. 4. Their drink offerings of blood Their libations of blood will not I 
will I not offer. pour out. 



23. 5. My cup runneth over. 



My cup is full to the brim. 



60. 3. Thou hast showed thy people Thou hast showed thy people hard 
hard things : thou hast made us to drink things : thou hast made us drink the 
the wine of astonishment. wine of trembling (or reeling). 



69. 12. They that sit in the gate speak They that sit in the gate speak against 
against me ; and I was the song of the me ; and songs are made about me by 
drunkards. the drinkers of strong drink. 



75. 8. For in the hand of the Lord 
there is a cup, and the wine is red ; it is 
full of mixture ; and he poureth out of 
the same : but the dregs thereof, all the 
wicked of the earth shall wring them out, 
and drink them. 

51 



For in the hand of the Lord is a 

goblet, and the wine is foaming; it is 
full of mixture ; and from this he poureth 
out: surely all the wicked of the earth 
shall suck out the dregs of it, and drink 
them up. 



402 



APPENDIX A. 



78. 65. Then the Lord awaked as one 
out of sleep, and like a mighty man that 
shouteth by reason of wine. 



Then the Lord awaked as one out of 
sleep, as a mighty man recovering him- 
self from wine. 



104. 14. He causeth the grass to grow 
for the cattle, and herb for the service of 
man : that he may bring forth food out 
of the earth ; 15. And wine that maketh 
glad the heart of man, and oil to make 
his face to shine, and bread which 
strengtheneth man's heart. 



He causeth grass to grow for the cattle, 
and grain for the cultivation of man, that 
he may bring forth food from the earth ; 
and wine which cheers the heart of man, 
(so as) to brighten his face more than 
oil, and bread which strengtheneth man's 
heart. 



107. 27. They reel to and fro, and 
stagger like a drunken man, and are at 
their wit's end. 



They are giddy, and stagger as a 
drunken man, and all their wisdom is 
swallowed up. 



Proverbs 3. 9. Honor the Lord with 
thy substance, and with the firstfruits of 
all thine increase : 10. So shall thy barns 
be filled with plenty, and thy presses 
shall burst out with new wine. 



Honor the Lord with thy substance, 
and with the firstfruits of all thine in- 
crease. So shall thy barns be filled with 
plenty, and with vine-fruit thy presses 
shall abound. 



20. I. Wine is a mocker, strong drink 
is raging: and whosoever is deceived 



thereby is not wise. 



Wine is a mocker, strong drink is 
raging : and whoever goes astray through 
it is not wise. 



23. 20. Be not among winebibbers : 
among riotous eaters of flesh: 21. For 
the drunkard and the glutton shall come 
to poverty. 



Be not among topers of wine ; among 
wasters of their flesh : for the toper and 
the waster ( = profligate) shall be made 
poor. 



23. 29. Who hath woe? who hath 
sorrow ? who hath contentions ? who 
hath babbling ? who hath wounds with- 
out cause? who hath redness of eyes? 
30. They that tarry long at the wine; 
they that go to seek mixed wine. 31. 
Look not thou upon the wine when 
it is red, when it giveth his color in 
the cup, when it moveth itself aright. 
32. At the last it biteth like a serpent, 
and stingeth like an adder. 33. Thine 
eyes shall behold strange women, and 
thine heart shall utter perverse things. 
34. Yea, thou shalt be as he that lieth 
down in the midst of the sea, or as he 
that lieth upon the top of a mast. 35. 
They have stricken me, shalt thou say, 
and I was not sick; they have beaten 
me, and I felt it not : when shall I awake ? 
I will seek it yet again. 



Who has lamentation? who has sor- 
row ? who has strifes ? who has brawling ? 
who has unnecessary wounds ? who has 
dark-discolored eyes? They that tarry 
long at the wine ; they that go to seek 
out mixed wine. Gaze not on wine 
when it is red, when it gives its bubble in 
the cup, when it moves itself straightly; 
for in the end it bites like a serpent 
and pierces like an adder. Thine eyes 
shall gaze upon abandoned women, and 
thine heart shall devise deceits. And 
thou shalt be like one lying in the midst 
of the sea, and like one lying on the top 
of a mast. [And thou wilt say] They 
have stricken me, but I cared not; 
they have beaten me, but I knew it not. 
When I am aroused I will gather myself 
up, and will seek it yet again. 



31, 4. It is not for kings, O Lemuel, 
it is not for kings to drink wine ; nor for 
princes strong drink : 5. Lest they drink, 



Not for kings is it, O Lemuel, not for 
kings is it to drink wine ; nor for princes 
to have desire of strong drink : lest they 



APPENDIX A. 



403 



and forget the law, and pervert the judg- 
ment of any of the afflicted. 6. Give 
strong drink unto him that is ready to 
perish, and wine unto those that be of 
heavy hearts. 7. Let him drink, and 
forget his poverty, and remember his 
misery no more. 



drink, and forget what is decreed, and 
change the judgment of any of the child- 
ren of affliction. Give strong drink to 
the perishing one, and wine to those 
bitter of spirit. He will drink, and forget 
his poverty, and his sorrow he will not 
remember again. 



Canticles 2. 4. He brought me to 
the banqueting house, and his banner 
over me was love. 5. Stay me with 
flagons, comfort me with apples : for I 
am sick of love. 



He brought me to the banqueting 
house, and his banner over me was love. 
Sustain me with raisin-cakes, refresh me 
with apples : for I am sick with love. 



2. 13. The fig tree putteth forth her 
green figs, and the vines with the tender 
grape give a good smell. 



The fig tree putteth forth her green 
figs, and the vines which are in blossom 
give forth a sweet odor. 



2. 15. Take us the foxes, the little 
foxes, that spoil the vines : for our vines 
have tender grapes. 



Take us the foxes (= jackals), the 
little foxes that spoil the vineyards : for 
our vineyards are in blossom. 



7. 9. And the roof of thy mouth like 
the best wine for my beloved, that goeth 
down sweetly, causing the lips of those 
that are asleep to speak. 



And thy palate like very good wine, 
going to my beloved straightly, flowing 
over the lips of the sleeping ones. 



8. 2. I would cause thee to drink of 
spiced wine of the juice of my pome- 
granate. 



I would give thee to drink of spiced 
wine of the fresh juice of my pome- 
granate. 



Isaiah i. 22. Thy silver is become Thy silver is become dross, thy boiled- 
dross, thy wine mixed with water. wine is diluted with water. 



5. 11. Woe unto them that rise up 
early in the morning, that they may 
follow strong drink ; that continue until 
night, till wine inflame them ! 



Woe (shall be to) those rjsing early in 
the morning — they pursue strong drink ; 
(woe shall be to) those tarrying into 
night — (for) wine inflames them. 



19. 10. And they shall be broken in 
the purposes thereof, all that make sluices 
and ponds for fish. 



Her pillars are broken down, and 
all the hired laborers are grieved in 
mind. 



24. 7. The new wine mourneth, the The vine-fruit has drooped, the vine 
vine languisheth, all the merryhearted has languished, all the merry-hearted 
do sigh. have sighed. 



24. 9. They shall not drink wine with With a song they shall not drink wine , 
a song; strong drink shall be bitter to bitter shall be the sweet-drink to those 
them that drink it. who drink it. 



404 



APPENDIX A. 



ISA. 25. 6. And in this mountain shall 
the Lord of hosts make unto all people a 
feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the 
lees, of fat things full of marrow, of 
wines on the lees well refined. 



And in this mountain shall the Lord 
of hosts make unto all people a feast of 
fat things, a feast of preserves, of fat 
things marrowed out, of well-clarified 
preserves. 



27. 2. A vineyard of red wine. 



A vineyard of foaming juice [or, A 
vineyard of delight]. 



28. I. Woe to the crown of pride, to 
the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glo- 
rious beauty is a fading flower, which 
are on the head of the fat valleys, of 
them that are overcome with wine. 



Lamentation (shall be to) the crown 
of beauty, the drunkards of Ephraim, 
whose glorious beauty is a fading flower 
which are on the head of the fat valleys 
of them that are smitten by wine. 



28. 7. But they also have erred through 
wine, and through strong drink are out 
of the way; the priest and the prophet 
have erred through strong drink, they 
are swallowed up of wine, they are out 
of the way through strong drink ; they 
err in vision, they stumble in judgment. 
8. For all tables are full of vomit and 
filthiness, so that there is no place clean. 



And these also have wandered through 
wine, and by means of strong drink have 
strayed ; the priest and the prophet have 
wandered by means of strong drink ; they 
have been swallowed down by wine ; they 
have strayed by means of strong drink; 
they have wandered in vision, they have 
staggered in judgment; for all (their) 
tables are full of voimit and filth; not 
one place is clean. 



36. 1 7. A land of corn and wine. 



A land of corn and vine-fruit. 



49. 26. And they shall be drunken And they shall drink to the full of 
with their own blood, as with sweet their own blood, as (though it were) 
wine. fresh-juice. 



51. 17. Awake, awake, stand up O 
Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand 
of the Lord the cup of his fury; thou 
hast drunken the dregs of the cup of 
trembling, and wrung them out. 



Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusa- 
lem, who hast drunk at the hand of the 
Lord the cup of his hot-wrath; thou 
hast drunken the lowest contents of the 
cup of trembling, and sucked it up. 



62. 8. . . . and the sons of the 
stranger shall not drink thy wine, for 
the which thou hast labored. 



And the sons of the stranger shall not 
drink thy vine-fruit, for which thou hast 
labored. 



will tread down the 
anger, and make them 



63. 6. And I 

people in mine 

drunk in my fury, and I will bring down 

their strength to the earth. 



And I have trodden the people in 
mine anger, and made them drunk with 
my hot-wrath, and I have brought down 
their strength to the earth. 



65. 8. Thus saith the Lord, As the 
new wine is found in the cluster, and 
one saith, Destroy it not ; for a blessing 
is in it ; so will I do for my servants' 
sakes, that I may not destroy them all. 



Thus saith the Lord, As the vine-fruit 
is in a (single) cluster, and one saith, 
Thou wilt not destroy it, for a blessing 
is with it ; so will I do for my servants' 
sakes, that I may not destroy them all. 



APPENDIX A. 



405 



65. II. . . . that furnish the drink 
offering unto that number. 



And that furnish to Fortune a mix- 
ture. 



Jeremiah 25. 15. For thus saith the 
Lord God of Israel unto me; Take the 
wine cup of this fury at my hand, and 
cause all the nations, to whom I send 
thee, to drink it. 16. And they shall 
drink, and be moved, and be mad, be- 
cause of the sword that I will send 
among them. 



For thus saith the Lord God of Israel 
unto me ; Take the wine-cup of this hot 
wrath from my hand, and cause all the 
nations, to whom I send thee, to drink 
it. And they shall drink, and shall 
reel, and shall become maddened, be- 
cause of the snare that I shall send 
among them. 



31. 12. Therefore they shall come 
and sing in the height of Zion, and 
shall flow together to the goodness of 
the Lord, for wheat, and for wine, and 
for oil. 



Therefore they shall come and sing in 
the height of Zion, and shall flow to- 
gether with the goodness of the Lord 
(viz.), with corn, and with vine-fruit, and 
with olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



Ezekiel 23. 42. And a voice of a 
multitude being at ease was with her: 
and with the men of the common sort 
were brought Sabeans from the wilder- 
ness, which put bracelets upon their 
hands, and beautiful crowns upon their 
heads. 



And there was the noise of a countless 
multitude in her ; and along with men 
of the common sort topers were brought 
from the open country; and they put 
bracelets on their hands, and beautiful 
wreaths upon their heads. 



Daniel 5. 2. Belshazzar, while he 
tasted the wine, commanded to bring the 
golden and silver vesels which his father 
Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the 
temple which was in Jerusalem. 



Belshazzar, while under the influence 
of wine, commanded to bring the golden 
and silver vessels, etc. 



Hosea 2. 8. For she did not know 
that I gave her corn, and wine, and 
oil. 



For she did not know that I gave 
her corn, and vine-fruit, and olive-and- 
orchard-fruit. 



2. 9. Therefore will I return, and take Therefore will I return, and take away 
away my corn in the time thereof, and my corn in the time thereof, and my 
my wine in the season thereof. vine-fruit in the season thereof. 



2. 22. And the earth shall hear the And the earth shall hear the corn, and 
corn, and the wine, and the oil. the vine-fruit, and the olive-and-orchard 

fruit. 



3. 1. . . .the children of Israel, who The children of Israel, who look to 
look to other gods, and love flagons of other gods, and love pressed-cakes of 
wine. grape-clusters. 



4. 11. Whoredom and wine and new Whoredom and wine and vine-fruit 
wine take away the heart. take away the heart. 



4. 18. Their drink is sour. 



Their boiled- wine is sour. 



4o6 



APPENDIX A. 



7. 5. In the day of our king the 
princes have made him sick with bottles 
of wine ; he stretched out his hand with 
scorners. 



On the king's (high) day the princes 
defiled themselves through the inflaming- 
heat of wine ; he drew out his hand with 
the mockers. 



7. 14. . . . they assemble themselves 
for corn and wine, and they rebel against 
me. 



For corn and vine-fruit they assemble 
themselves ; they rebel against me. 



9. 2. The floor and the winepress 
shall not feed them, and the new wine 
shall fail in her. 



The floor and the wine-press shall not 
feed them, and the vine-fruit shall fail 
in her. 



14. 7. . . . they shall revive as the They shall revive as the corn, and 
corn, and grow as the vine : the scent bud forth as the vine : his memorial shall 
thereof shall be as the wine of Lebanon, be like wine of Lebanon. 



Joel i. 5. Awake, ye drunkards, and 
weep ; and howl, all ye drinkers of 
wine, because of the new wine ; for it is 
cut off from your mouth. 



Awake, ye that fill yourselves, and 
weep ; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, 
because of the fresh-juice; for it is cut 
off from your mouth. 



I. 10. The field is wasted, the land 
mourneth; for the corn is wasted: the 
new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth. 



The field is wasted, the land mourn- 
eth; for the corn is wasted: the vine- 
fruit is dried up, the olive-and-orchard- 
fruit droops. 



2. 19. Behold, I will send you corn, Behold, I will send you corn, and 
and wine, and oil. vine-fruit, and olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



2. 24. And the floors shall be full of 
wheat, and the fats shall overflow with 
wine and oil. 



And the floors shall be full of wheat, 
and the presses shall abound with vine- 
fruit and olive-and-orchard-fruit. 



3. 13. Put ye in the sickle, for the 
harvest is ripe : come, get you down ; 
for the press is full, the fats overflow; 
for their wickedness is great. 



Put forth the knife, for the vintage is 
ripe : come, descend, for the press is 
full, the presses abound ; for their 
wickedness is great. 



3. 18. And it shall come to pass, And it shall come to pass, that the 
that the mountains shall drop down new mountains shall drop down fresh-juice, 
wine. 



Amos 9. 13. . . . and the mountains 
shall drop sweet wine, and all the hills 
shall melt. 



And the mountains shall drop fresh- 
juice, and all the hills shall melt. 



Obadiah 16. . . . yea, they shall 
drink, and they shall swallow down, and 
they shall be as though they had not 
been. 



Yea, they shall drink, and they shall 
suck up, and they shall be as though 
they had not been. 



APPENDIX A. 



407 



Micah 6. 15. Thou shalt sow, but 
thou shalt not reap ; thou shalt tread the 
olives, but thou shalt not anoint thee 
with oil ; and sweet wine, but shalt not 
drink wine. 



Thou shalt sow, but thou shalt not 

reap; thou shalt tread the olives, but 

thou shalt not anoint thee with oil; and 

(thou shalt tread) the vine-fruit, but 
shalt not drink wine. 



Nahum 1. 10. For while they be For as they are folden together as 

folden together as thorns, and while thorns, and as they are soaked with their 

they are drunken as drunkards, they boiled-wine, they shall be devoured as 

shall be devoured as stubble fully dry. stubble fully dry. 



PIabakkuk 2. 5. Yea also, because And, in truth, as wine is a defrauder, 

he transgresseth by wine, he is a proud so is the strong man who is arrogant, 

man, neither keepeth at home, who and does not rest, who enlarges his 

enlargeth his desire as hell, and is as desire as the under-world, etc. 
death, and cannot be satisfied. 



2. 15. Woe unto him that giveth his 
neighbor drink, that puttest thy bottle 
to him, and makest him drunken also, 
that thou mayest look on their naked- 
ness ! 16. Thou art filled with shame 
for glory : drink thou also, and let thy 
foreskin be uncovered: the cup of the 
Lord's right hand shall be turned unto 
thee, and shameful spewing shall be on 
thy glory. 



Woe is to him who giveth drink to 
his neighbor, pouring out thy inflaming 
draught, and even making him drunk in 
order to gaze upon his nakedness ! Thou 
shalt be satiated with shame rather than 
with glory ; drink thou also, and be now 
(as one) uncircumcised : there shall be 
passed to thee the cup of Jehovah's 
right hand, and infamy shall be on thy 
glory. 



Haggai 1. 11. And I called for a 
drought upon the land, and upon the 
mountains, and upon the corn, and upon 
the new wine, and upon the oil, and 
upon that which the ground bringeth 
forth, and upon men, and upon cattle, 
and upon all the labor of the hands. 



And I called for a drought upon the 
land, and upon the mountains, and upon 
the corn, and upon the vine-fruit, and 
upon the olive-and-orchard-fruit, and 
upon whatever else the ground bringeth 
forth, and upon men, and upon cattle, 
and upon all the labor of the hands. 



Zechariah 9. 15. . . . and they 
shall drink, and make a noise as through 
wine ; and they shall be filled like bowls, 
and as the corners of the altar. 



And they shall drink, and rage as 
wine ; and they shall be filled as bowls, 
and as the corners of the altar. 



9. 1 7. For how great is his goodness, 
and how great is his beauty ! corn shall 
make the young men cheerful, and new 
wine the maids. 



For how great is his goodness, and 
how great is his beauty ! (his) corn 
makes the young men to thrive, and (his) 
vine-fruit the maidens. 



10. 7. And they of Ephraim shall be 
like a mighty man, and their heart shall 
rejoice as through wine. 



And they of Ephraim shall be like a 
mighty man, and their heart shall be 
glad as (they who drink) wine. 



Malachi 3. 11. . . . neither shall 
your vine cast her fruit before the time 
in the field, saith the Lord of hosts. 



Neither shall the vine in the field 
be barren to you, saith the Lord of 
hosts. 



408 



APPENDIX A. 



II.— THE NEW TESTAMENT. 



Matthew 5. 29. And if thy right 
eye offend thee, pluck it out, and cast it 
from thee. . . . 30. And if thy right 
hand offend thee, cut it off, and cast it 
from thee. 



And if thy right eye cause thee to 
transgress, pluck it out, and cast it from 
thee. And if thy right hand cause 
thee to transgress, cut it off, and cast it 
from thee. 



9. 1 7. Neither do men put new wine 
into old bottles : else the bottles break, 
and the wine runneth out, and the bottles 
perish : but they put new wine into new 
bottles, and both are preserved. 



Nor indeed do they place new wine 
in old skin-bottles; otherwise the skin- 
bottles are rent, and the wine is spilled, 
and the skin-bottles are destroyed ; but 
they place new wine in new skin-bottles 
and both are kept together. 



10. 42. And whosoever shall give to 
drink unto one of these little ones a cup 
of cold water only in the name of a dis- 
ciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in 
no wise lose his reward. 



And whosoever shall give to drink 
unto one of these little ones a cup only 
of cold water in the name of a disciple, 
verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise 
lose his reward. 



26. 17. Now the first day of the feast 
of unleavened bread the disciples came 
to Jesus, saying unto him, Where wilt 
thou that we prepare for thee to eat the 
passover ? 



Now the first day of the feast of un- 
fermented things, the disciples came to 
Jesus, etc. 



Mark 2. 22. And no man putteth 
new wine into old bottles : else the new 
wine doth burst the bottles, and the 
wine is spilled, and the bottles will be 
marred : but new wine must be put into 
new bottles. 



And no one places new wine into old 
skin-bottles; otherwise the wine will 
rend the skin-bottles, and the wine is 
spilled, and the skin-bottles will be de- 
stroyed. But new wine should be placed 
in new skin-bottles. 



Luke 5. 37. And no man putteth 
new wine into old bottles ; else the new 
wine will burst the bottles, and be spilled 
and the botdes shall perish. 38. But 
new wine must be put into new bottles ; 
and both are preserved. 39. No man 
also having drunk old wine straightway 
desireth new : for he saith, The old is 
better. 



And no one places new wine in old 
skin-bottles; otherwise the new wine 
will rend the skin-bottles, and it will be 
spilled, and the bottles will be destroyed. 
But new wine should be placed in new 
skin-bottles, and both are kept together. 
And no one having drunk old wine im- 
mediately desires new : for he declares, 
The old is better. 



21. 34. And take heed to yourselves, 
lest at any time your hearts be over- 
charged with surfeiting, and drunken- 
ness, and cares of this life, and so that 
day come upon you unawares. 



John 2. 1. And the third day there 
was a marriage in Cana of Galilee ; and 
the mother of Jesus was there : 2. And 
both Jesus was called, and his disciples, 
to the marriage. 3. And when they 
wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith 



And take heed to yourselves, lest at 
any time your hearts be weighed down 
with debauchery, and drinkings, and 
cares of this life, and so that day come 
unforeseen upon you. 



And the third day there was a mar- 
riage in Cana of Galilee ; and the mo- 
ther of Jesus was there : and both Jesus 
was invited, and his disciples, to the 
marriage. And wine running short, the 
mother of Jesus saith to him, They have 



APPENDIX A. 



409 



unto him, They have no wine. 4. Jesus 
saith unto her, Woman, what have I to 
do with thee? mine hour is not yet 
come. ... 9. When the ruler of the 
feast had tasted the water that was made 
wine, and knew not whence it was : 
(but the servants which drew the water 
knew;) the governor of the feast called 
the bridegroom, 10. And saith unto 
him, Every man at the beginning doth 
set forth good wine; and when men 
have well drunk, then that which is 
worse : but thou hast kept the good 
wine until now. II. This beginning of 
miracles did Jesus in Cana of Galilee, 
and manifested forth his glory; and his 
disciples believed on him. 



no wine. Jesus saith to her, O woman, 
what (object in common) is there be- 
tween me and thee ? mine hour is not 
yet come. When the president tasted 
the water that was made wine, and 
knew not whence it was obtained (but 
the servants who had drawn the water 
knew), the president called the bride- 
groom, and said to him, Every man 
places first (before his guests) the choice 
wine ; and when they are well-filled, 
then the inferior kind; but thou hast 
kept back the choice wine until now. 
This beginning of miracles Jesus did in 
Cana of Galilee; and he displayed his 
glory: and his disciples put faith in 
him. 



Acts of the Apostles, 2. 13. But others jeeringly said, that they 
Others mocking said, These men are were filled with sweet-wine, 
full of new wine. 



Epistle to the Romans, 13. 13. 
Let us walk honestly, as in the day ; not 
in rioting and drunkenness, not in cham- 
bering and wantonness, not in strife and 
envying. 



Let us walk becomingly, as in the 
day ; not in revelries and drinkings, not 
in chambering and wantonness, not in 
strife and envying. 



14. 18. For he that in these things 
serveth Christ is acceptable to God, and 
approved of men. 19. Let us therefore 
follow after the things which make for 
peace, and things wherewith one may 
edify another. 20. For meat destroy 
not the work of God. All things indeed 
are pure ; but it is evil for that man who 
eateth with offence. 



For he that in this matter serveth 
Christ is well-pleasing to God and ap- 
proves himself to men. Let us therefore 
pursue the things which make for peace, 
and the things by which we may build 
up one another. Do not demolish the 
work of God for the sake of meat. Every- 
thing, indeed, is pure; but it is evil to 
that man whose eating it makes it a cause 
of stumbling. 



First Epistle to the Corinthians, 
5. 6. Your glorying is not good. Know 
ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the 
whole lump ? 7. Purge out therefore the 
old leaven, that ye may be a new 
lump, as ye are unleavened. For even 
Christ our passover is sacrificed for us : 
8. Therefore let us keep the feast, not 
with old leaven, neither with the leaven 
of malice and wickedness ; but with the 
unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. 



Your self-glorifying is not good. Know 
ye not that a little leaven fermenteth the 
whole lump? Purge out therefore the 
old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, 
as ye are unfermented. For even Christ 
our paschal-lamb is sacrificed. There- 
fore let us keep the feast, not with old 
leaven, neither with the leaven of malice 
and wickedness ; but with the unfer- 
mented-things of sincerity and truth. 



6. 12. All things are lawful unto me, 
but all things are not expedient: all 
things are lawful for me, but I will not 
be brought under the power of any. 



All things are possible to me, but ail 
things are not of advantage : all things 
are possible to me, but I will not allow 
myself to be overruled by anything. 



8. 13. Wherefore, if meat make my 
brother to offend, I will eat no flesh 
while the world standeth, lest I make 
my brother to offend. 

52 



Wherefore, if meat cause my brother 
to transgress, I will eat no flesh for ever, 
in order that I may not cause my brother 
to transgress. 



4io 



APPENDIX A. 



9. 25. And every man that striveth for And every one who contends (in the 
the mastery is temperate in all things. games) controls himself in all things. 



10. 23. All things are lawful for me, 
but all things are not expedient : all 
things are lawful for me, but all things 
edify not. 24. Let no man seek his 
own, but every man another's wealth. 



All things are possible to me, but all 
things are not advantageous ; all things 
are possible to me, but all things do not 
build up. Let no man seek (merely) 
his own, but every man another's good. 



10. 32. Give none offence, neither to 
the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the 
church of God : 33. Even as I please all 
men in all things, not seeking mine own 
profit, but the profit of many, that they 
may be saved. 



Be not stumbling-blocks, either to the 
Jews, or to the Gentiles, or to the church 
of God. Even as I please all men in all 
things, not seeking my own advantage, 
but the advantage of the many, that they 
may be saved. 



11. 1. Be ye followers of me, even as Be ye imitators of me, as I also am of 
I also am of Christ. Christ. 



11. 21. For in eating every one taketh For in the act of eating every one 
before other his own supper ; and one is snatches up his own meal : and one is 
hungry, and another is drunken. hungry, and another is filled-out. 



The Epistle to the Ephesians, 
5. 18. And be not drunk with wine, 
wherein is excess ; but be filled with the 
Spirit. 



The Epistle to the Philippians, 
4. 5. Let your moderation be known 
unto all men. The Lord is at hand. 



And be not surcharged with wine, in 
which is dissoluteness ; but be filled with 
the Spirit. 



Let your forbearance be known unto 
all men. The Lord is at hand. 



The First Epistle to the Thessa- Therefore let us not sleep, as do 
lonians, 5. 6. Therefore let us not others ; but let us be wakeful and 
sleep, as do others 
and be sober. 



but let us watch abstain. 



5. 21. Prove all things; hold fast that 
which is good. 



Test all things : 
is good. 



hold fast that which 



5. 22. Abstain from all appearance of 
evil. 



Hold aloof from every aspect of evil. 



The First Epistle to Timothy, 
3. 2. A bishop then must be blameless, 



the husband of one wife, 
3. Not given to wine. 



vigilant, sober. 



A bishop then should be blameless, 
the husband of one wife, abstinent, sober- 
minded. 

Not a wine-guest. 



3. II. Even so must their wives be Even so must their wives be grave, 
grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in not slanderers, abstinent, faithful in all 
all things. things. 



6. 10. For the love of money is the For the love of money is a root of all 
root of all evil. (these) evils. 



APPENDIX A. 



411 



The Epistle to Titus, i. 7. For For a bishop must be blameless, not a 

a bishop must be blameless, . . . not wine-guest, sober-minded, self-restrain- 

given to wine, ... 8. . . . sober, ing. 
. . . temperate. 



2. 2. That the aged men be sober, That the aged men be abstinent, grave, 
grave, temperate. sober-minded. 



2. 3. The aged women likewise, that The aged women also, that they cause 

they ... 4. . . . teach the young the young women to be sober-minded, 

women to be sober. ... 5. To be dis- To be sober-minded, 
creet. 



2. 12. Teaching us that 
should live soberly. 



we Teaching us that we should live sober- 
mindedly. 



The First Epistle general of 
Peter, i. 13. Wherefore gird up the 
loins of your mind, be sober. 



4. 3. For the time past of our life may 
suffice us to have wrought the will of the 
Gentiles, when we walked in lascivious- 
ness, lusts, excess of wine, revelings, 
banquetings, and abominable idolatries : 
4. Wherein they think it strange that ye 
run not with them to the same excess of 
riot, speaking evil of you. 



Wherefore gird up the loins of your 
mind, being abstinent. 



For the time past of our life may 
suffice us to have wrought the will of the 
Gentiles, when we walked in lascivious- 
ness, lusts, excesses of wine, debaucher- 
ies, drinkings, and abominable idolatries : 
wherein they think it strange that ye run 
not with them to the same outpouring of 
dissoluteness, speaking evil of you. 



4. 7. But the end of all things is at 
hand : be ye therefore sober, and watch 
unto prayer. 



But the end of all things is at hand : 
be ye therefore sober-minded, and be 
abstinent in order to prayers. 



5. 8. Be sober, be vigilant; because Be abstinent (= drink not), be wake- 

your adversary the devil, as a roaring ful ; because your adversary the devil, as 

lion, walketh about, seeking whom he a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking 

may devour. whom he may devour (= drink down). 



Revelation of St John, 14. 8. And 
there followed another angel, saying, 
Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great 
city, because she made all nations drink 
of the wine of the wrath of her fornica- 
tion. 



And there followed another angel, 
saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that 
great city, because she made all nations 
drink of the wine of the passion (= the 
raging or inflaming wine) of her fornica- 
tion. 



14. 10. The same shall drink of the 
wine of the wrath of God, which is 
poured out without mixture into the cup 
of his indignation. 



1 7. 6. And I saw the woman drunken 
with the blood of the saints, and with the 
blood of the martyrs of Jesus. 



The same shall drink of the wine of 
the wrath of God, which is mixed and 
undiluted in the cup of his indignation. 



And I saw the woman glutted with the 
blood of the saints, and with the blood 
of the martyrs of Jesus. 



APPENDIX B, 



CONCORDANCE OF HEBREW, CHALDEE, GREEK, AND 
LATIN TERMS. 



[This List comprises such Terms as tend to illustrate the great object of inquiry 
prosecuted in this work, — the testimony of Scripture upon the use and disuse 
of intoxicating drinks. ] 



THE OLD TESTAMENT. 



I. 

Hebrew Words translated 'wine' or 'strong drink 
Authorized Version. 



in THE 



I. Yayin (by some written Yin, Yain, or Ain) stands generically for the 

expressed juice of the grape, — the context sometimes indicating whether the 

juice had undergone, or not, the process of fermentation. It is mentioned 141 
times, as follows : 



Genesis. 

9. 21, 24, Noah drinking it and awaking 

from it. 
14. 18, Melchizedek presenting it. 
l 9- 3 2 > 33> 34> 35> the daughters of Lot 

inducing their father to drink it. 
27. 25, offered to Isaac by Jacob. 
49. 11, 12, named in the blessing on Ju- 

dah, as equivalent to the ' blood of 

grapes,' and as coloring the eyes. 

Exodus. 
29. 40, commanded as a ' drink-offering, ' 
— i. e. a libation. 

Leviticus. 

10. 9, prohibited to the priests while 
ministering. 

23. 13, described as a libation. 

Numbers. 
6. 3 (twice), 4, prohibited to the Naza- 
rites. 



6. 20, permitted to one ceasing to be a 

Nazarite. 



5, 7, 
14, 



10, > 



mentioned as a libation. 



Deuteronomy. 
14. 26, permitted to be purchased in lieu 
of tiros h. 

28. 39, its absence threatened as a 
punishment. 

29. 6, referred to as not provided in the 

wilderness. 
32. 33, compared to the inflaming poison 

of dragons. 
32. 38, said, figuratively, to be drunk by 

heathen gods. 

Joshua. 
9. 4, 13, used by the Gibeonites. 

Judges. 
13. 4, 7, 14 (twice), prohibited to Sam- 
son's mother. 



APPENDIX B. 



413 



19. 19, included by a Levite among his 
traveling stores. 

1 Samuel. 

I. 14, 15, its use charged upon Hannah, 
and repudiated by her. 

1. 24, comprised among Hannah's offer- 

ings. 

10. 3, carried by an Israelite. 
16. 20, sent by Jesse to Saul. 

25. 18, presented by Abigail to David. 
25. 37, described as ' having gone out ' of 
Nabal. 

2 Samuel. 
13. 28, drunk by Amnon. 

16. 1, 2, sent to David by Mephibosheth. 

1 Chronicles. 

9. 29, in the charge of the Levites. 

12. 40, presented at a feast. 

27. 27, enumerated among David's 
stores. 

2 Chronicles. 

2. 10, 15, promised to Hiram by Solo- 

mon, and accepted by him. 

11. II, classed among Rehoboam's stores. 

Nehemiah. 

2. 1 (twice), presented by Nehemiah to 
Artaxerxes. 

5. 15, received by governors as tribute. 

5. 18, ' all sorts ' of. forwarded to Ne- 
hemiah.* 

13. 15, an article of merchandise. 

Esther. 
I. 7> provided by Ahasuerus. 
I. 10, making Ahasuerus merry. 



32 



> presented at a banquet. 



6; 

2, 7, Q, ) 

Job. 

13, 18, drunk by Job's sons and 
daughters. 
, 19, bursting new bottles. 
Psalms. 
wine of astonishment ' (or trem- 



60. 3 

bling). 

75. 8, 'red' (or foaming). 
78. 65, associated with (or dispossessed 

from) a mighty man. 
104. 15, gladdening man's heart. 

Proverbs. 
4. 17, procured by violence, 
9. 2, 5, mingled and offered by Wisdom. 

20. 1, designated ' a mocker' (or scorner). 

21. 17, the lover of, not getting rich. 
23. 20, bibbers of, proscribed. 

23. 30, tarrying at, condemned. 
23. 31, forbidden to be desired when red. 
31.4, not to be drunk by kings. 
31.6, used by the bitter-hearted to pro- 
duce oblivion. 



ECCLESIASTES. 

2. 3, drunk in pursuit of ' good.' 

9. 7, to be consumed with a merry heart. 

10. 19, making merry. 

Canticles. 

1. 2, 4, not equal to virtuous love. 

2. 4, 'the house of wine.' [A. V., 'ban- 

queting-house.'] 

4. 10, not equal to virtuous love. 

5. I, drunk with milk. 

7. 9, delicious to the taste. 

8. 2, spiced and given to be drunk. 

Isaiah. 
5. II, inflaming men. 
5. 12, associated with a feast. 
5. 22, those mighty to drink it con- 
demned. 
16. 10, absent from the presses. 
22. 13, joined with ' eating flesh.' 
24. 9, not drunk with a song. 

24. II, clamored for in the streets. 
28. 1, overcoming men. 

28. 7 (twice), causing to err, swallowing 

up the priest and prophet. 

29. 9, ^drunkenness present without 
51. 21, 5 it. 

55. 1, invitation to buy it. 

56. 12, drunk to excess. 

Jeremiah. 

13. 12, (twice), bottles of, filled. 
2 3- 9, overcoming a man. 

25. 15, drunk out of a cup. 

35. 2, 5 (twice), 6 (twice), 8, 14, pre- 
sented to the Rechabites,and refused. 
40. 10, 12, gathered with summer fruits. 
48. 33, absent from the wine-presses. 
51. 7, making the nations mad. 
Lamentations. 

2. 12, asked for by children. 

Ezekiel. 
27. 18, 'wine of Helbon.' 
44. 21, forbidden to officiating priests. 

Daniel. 
1. 5, part of the king's provisions. 
1. 8, declined by Daniel and his friends. 
I. 16, taken away from Daniel and his 

friends. 
10. 3, not used by Daniel for three weeks. 

Hosea. 
4. II, 'taking away' the heart. 
7. 5, making the princes ' sick.' 

9. 4, not offered to the Lord. 

14. 7, ' wine of Lebanon. ' 

Joel. 
I. 5, drinkers of, called upon to howl 
because of its scarcity. 

3. 3, bought in exchange for a girl. 



* Presumably ' good ' — not ' the wine of reeling. 



4H 



APPENDIX B. 



Amos. 
2. 8, belonging to those condemned (or 

fined). 
2. 12, wickedly given to the Nazarites. 



withheld as a punishment. 
6. 6, drunk in bowls. 
g. 14, promised to Israel. 

MlCAH. 

2. II, untruly promised by false prophets. 
6. 15, withheld as a punishment. 

Habakkuk. 
2. 5 j described as' causing transgression ' 
(or as a defrauder). 
Zephaniah. 

1. 13, withheld as a punishment. 

Haggai. 

2. 12, named along with bread, etc. 

Zechariah. 

9. 15, named as causing a noise. 

10. 7, said to gladden the heart. 



Chaldee. — The Targumists almost 
uniformly render yayin by khamar or 
khamrah, the generic Chaldee word for 
wine. When yayin is connected with 
shakar, however, yayin is distinguished 
as khamar khadath, 'new wine.' In 
Esth. 1. 7, yayin is rendered by khamar 
ahsis, 'fresh wine,' and in Job 32. 19 
by khamrah khadath, 'new wine.' 

Greek. — All the versions translate 



yayin by oinos, but in Job 32. 19 the 
Lxx. reads gleukos, 'sweet wine,' and 
Symmachus neos oinos, ' new wine. ' In 
Esth. I. 10 oinos is absent, and also in 
chap. 5. 6, 7. 2, and 7. 7, where 'ban- 
quet of wine ' is rendered by sumpo- 
sios or potos. In Job I. 18, oinos is 
omitted, and only peinonton, 'drinking,' 
given. In Prov. 23. 20, oinopotees, 'a 
wine-drinker,' is the rendering of sovai 
yayin. In Prov. 23. 30, 31, the plural 
oinois is given. 

Latin. — The Vulgate renders yayin 
by vinum, but in Esth. I. 19 it has 
merum, ' neat (undiluted) wine,' and in 
Job 32. 19 mustum, ' fresh grape-juice ' 
= new wine. In Josh. 9. 4 it renders 
' bags of yayin ' by uires vinarios ; and in 
I Chron. 27. 27, ' for the cellars (or stores) 
of yayin,'' by cellis vinariis, 'over the 
wine-cellars.' In Esth. 5. 6, and 7. 7, 
' banquet of yayin ' is rendered locum 
convivii, ' place of feasting '; and in chap. 
7. 2, ' after the banquet of wine ' is ren- 
der edpostauam incalueratvino, 'after he 
was heated with wine.' In Prov. 23. 20 
the V. has in conviviis potatorum, ' among 
feasts of drinkers. ' In Cant. 2. 4, ' house 
of wine' [A. V., 'banqueting-house'] is 
rendered cellam vinariam, ' wine-cellar.' 
In Jer. 40. 10 yayin is rendered vindemia, 
'vintage-fruit,' but in ver. 12 vinum. 



2. Tirosh (pronounced teerosh) is a collective name for the natural produce of 
the vine. It is generally associated with dahgan, 'corn,' and yitzhar, the fruit of 
the olive and the orchard. Both ancient and modern versions have strangely mis- 
conceived the true nature of this famous triad of blessings by regarding tirosh and 
yitzhar as liquids; the first as 'wine,' or 'new wine,' and the latter as 'oil.' By 
a comparison of texts and contexts the English reader may judge for himself 
between the traditional rendering and the one adopted in this work. Tirosh 
occurs thirty-eight times in the Hebrew Bible. 

Genesis. 



27. 28, joined with corn as promised to 

Jacob. 
27. 37, joined with corn as above. 

Numbers. 
18. 12, joined with yitzhar and corn as 
firstfruits. 

Deuteronomy. 
7. 13, joined with corn and yitzhar as 
the fruit of the land. 

11. 14, gathered along with corn and 
yitzhar. 

12. 17, to be eaten as tithes with corn 
and yitzha?. 

14. 23, the same. 



18. 4, joined with corn and yitzhar as 

firstfruits. 
28. 51, joined with corn and yitzhar as 

destroyed by the invader. 
33. 28, joined with corn as the produce 

of the land. 

Judges. 
9. 13, which the vine claims as its own, 

and refuses to leave. 
2 Kings. 
18. 32, joined with corn as the produce 

of the land. 

2 Chronicles. 
31. 5, joined with corn, yitzhar, and 

honey (or dates) as firstfruits. 



APPENDIX B. 



415 



32. 28, joined with corn and yitzhar as 
kept in storehouses. 
Nehemiah. 

5. 11, joined with corn and yitzhar as 

tribute in kind. 
10. 37, joined with the fruit of all manner 

of trees. 
10. 39, joined with corn and yitzhar. 
13. 5, 12, joined with corn and yitzhar 

as tithes. 

Psalms. 
4. 7, joined with corn as causing joy by 

its increase. 

Proverbs. 

3. 10, described as ' bursting ' or filling 

the presses, in association with 

crowded barns. 

Isaiah. 
24. 7, described as mourning while the 

vine languished. 
36. 17, joined with corn as produce of 

the land. 
62, 8, described as not to be drunk 

(z. e. its juice) by strangers, but to 

be brought together and drunk by 

the Jews, like as corn was to be 

gathered and eaten. 
65. 8, described as 'found in a cluster.' 

Jeremiah. 
31. 12, joined with corn and yitzhar as 

part of the goodness of the Lord. 
Hosea. 
2. 8, joined with corn and yitzhar as 

given by God. 
2. 9, joined with corn as taken away by 

God. 
2. 22, joined with corn and yitzhar as 

' heard ' by their mother earth. 

4. II, joined with whoredom and wine 

{yayhi) as ' taking away ' the heart. 
7. 14, joined with corn as the cause of 

heathen assemblies. 
9. 2, described as failing from the press 

in connection with the corn-floor. 
Joel. 

1. 10, described as 'dried up,' as the 

corn is 'wasted,' and the yitzhar 
'languisheth.' 

2. 19, promised by God along with corn 

and yitzhar. 
2. 24, said to 'overflow* (or abound in) 
the press, together with yitzhar, 
as the floors are full of 'wheat.' 
Micah. 

6. 15, said when trodden to produce 



yayin, as olives, when trodden, 
yield shemen (oil). 

Haggai. 
1. 11, joined with corn and yitzhar as 
suffering from drought. 

Zechariah. 
9. 17, said to make the virgins cheerful 
(or to grow), as corn the young 
men. % 



Obs. I. Tiros h is connected with corn 
and yitzhar nineteen times, with corn 
alone eleven times, with the vine three 
times, and is otherwise named five 
times ; in all thirty-eight times. 

Obs. 2. Tirosh is translated in the 
A. V. twenty-six times by 'wine,' 
eleven times by new wine (Neh. 10. 39; 
13. 5, 12; Prov. 3. 10; Isa. 24. 7; 65. 
8; Hos. 4. 11; 9. 2; Joel 1. 10; Hag. 
I. II; Zech. 9. 17), and once (Micah 
6. 15) by 'sweet wine,' where the mar- 
gin has ' new wine. ' 



Chaldee. — The general rendering of 
tirosh in the Targum is by khamar, or 
hamrah, thus making no distinction 
between yayin and tirosh. But in ' 
Numb. 18. 12, Jonathan's rendering, kha- 
mar inbah, ' wine of the grape, ' indi- 
cates a perception of the relation of tirosh 
to the grape while ungathered and un- 
expressed. The Targum on Hos. 4. 1 1 
interprets tirosh by ravyethah, ' drunk- 
enness,' or 'satiation,' but in Joel I. 10 
by 'vines.' 

Greek. — The Lxx. renders tirosh in 
every case but twice by oinos, the generic 
name for yayin ; the exceptions being 
Isa. 65. 8, where rhox, 'grape-stone,' is 
given, and Hos. 4. 1 1, where the ren- 
dering is methusma, 'strong drink.' 
Aquila's version in Deut. 7. 13 has 
opotismon, 'autumnal fruit,' and in Isa. 
26. 7, pardris7iios, ' fruit out of season ' ; 
but very possibly paror is a transcriber's 
error for apor, the reading in Deut. 

7- 13- 

Latin. — The Vulgate, though as a 
rule translating tirosh by vimim, ' wine,' 
has some exceptions : — Deut. 7. 13, vin- 
demia, ' vintage-fruit ' ; Neh. 10. 37, 
vindemia ; Isa. 24. 7, vindemia ; Isa. 
65. 8, granum, ' a grain, '=young grape ; 
Hos. 4. II, ebrietas, 'drunkenness.' 



3. Khemer (Hebrew, kh-m-r, pronounced khemer) is a word descriptive of the 
foaming appearance of the juice of the grape newly expressed, or when undergoing 



4i6 



APPENDIX B. 



fermentation. It occurs but nine times in all — including once as a verb, and six 
times in its Chaldee form of kkamar or khamrah. 



Deuteronomy. 
32. 14, applied to the 'blood of the 
grape, ' rendered in A. V. ' pure. ' 
Ezra. 

6. 9, ) occurs in Chaldee decrees of 

7. 22, ) Cyrus and Artaxerxes. 

Psalms. 
75. 8, ' the wine is red,' khamar (foams). 

Isaiah. 
27. 2, 'a vineyard of khemer,' rendered 
in A. V. ' red wine,' but the Hebrew 
text is doubtful. 

Daniel. 
5. I, 2, 4, 23, named in a Chaldee de- 
scription of Belshazzar's feast. 
Chaldee. — In Deut. 32, 14, Jonathan 
has khamor sumaq, ' red wine. ' In Psa. 
75. 8, the Targum has khamar ashin, 



' strong wine.' In Isa. 27. 2, the Tar- 
gumists read khemed (fruitful or beauti- 
ful), not khemer. 

Greek. — In Deut. 32. 14, the Lxx. 

has oinon. Aquila gives attsteeron, 
'rough.' In Psa. 75. 8, the Lxx. has 
oinos akratos, '(the wine is) pure,' i. e. 
undiluted. In Isa. 27. 2, the Lxx. has 
kalos, 'beautiful,' following the reading 
of khemed. In the other places oinos is 
given. 

Latin. — In Deut. 32. 14, the V. has 

meracissimum, 'purest.' In Psa. 75. 8, 
and Isa. 27. 2, merum, 'pure (wine).' 
In the other passages vinum is used, or 
the Hebrew word is not definitely trans- 
lated. 



4. AHSIS (sometimes written ausis, asis, osis) is specifically applied to the juice 
of the newly-trodden grapes or other fruit. It occurs five times. 

Chaldee. — In Cant. 8. 2, no equiva- 
lent to ahsis is given ; but in the other 
passages the rendering is khamar mariih 
(or maratli), 'pure wine.' 

Greek. — In Cant. 8. 2, the Lxx. has 
nama, ' spring ' (or juice) ; in Isa. 49. 26, 
oinos neos, 'new wine'; in Joel 1. 5, it 
seems to paraphrase ahsis by euphrosunee 

hni /-h/wri < nrl o rl r» *=> c c onrl ir\iT ' * CJnn in 



Canticles. 

8. 2, applied to ' the juice ' of the pome- 

granate. 

Isaiah. 

49. 26, compared to blood; rendered 

' sweet wine ' (A. V.). 

Joel. 

I. 5, represented as cut off; rendered 

' new wine ' (A. V. ). 
3. 18, mountains said to drop ahsis; 
rendered ' new wine ' (A. V. ). 
Amos. 

9. 13, the same ; ' sweet wine ' (A. V. ). 



Joel 2. 18, and Amos 9. 13, the rendering 
is glukasmon, ' sweetness.' 

Latin. — In Cant. 8. 2, and Isa. 49. 
26, the Vulgate has mustum, and in the 
other passages dulcido, 'sweetness.' 



5. Soveh (sometimes written sobe, sobhe) denotes a luscious, and probably 
boiled wine (Latin, sapd). It occurs three times. 

Isaiah. 
1. 22, diluted with water ; ' win 
(A. V.). 

Hosea. 
4. 18, turned sour; 'drink' (A. V.). 



Nahum. 
I. 10, drink to excess; 'drunken' (A.V.). 



Chaldee. — Isa. 1. 22, khamar, 



' wine ' ; Hos. 4. 18, ' feastings ' ; Nah. 
I. 10, 'wine.' 

Greek. — Isa. 1. 22, the Lxx. and 
Symmachus, oinos ; Aquila, sumposion, 
' drinking-feast ' ; in Hos. 4. 18, and Nah. 
I. 10, the Lxx. has a different reading 
of the Hebrew text. 

Latin. — Isa. 1. 22, vinum, 'wine'; 
Hos. 4. 18, and Nah. I. 10, convivium, 
'feast.' 



6. Mesek (sometimes written mesecJi) is used with its related forms mezeg and 
mimsak to denote some liquid compounded of various ingredients. These words 
occur as nouns four times, in a verbal shape five times. 



APPENDIX B. 



417 



Psalms. 
75. 8, applied to the cup of Divine wrath ; 
full of mesek, 'mixture ' (A. V.). 
Proverbs. 
23. 30, referring to them who seek mim- 
sak, ' mixed wine ' (A. V. ). 
Canticles. 
7. 2, meseg, 'mixture' (A.V.). 

Isaiah. 

65. II, mimsak, 'drink-offering' (A. V.). 

The verbal form occurs — 

Proverbs. 

9. 2, 5, wisdom has ' mingled ' her wine. 

Isaiah. 
5. 22, men mighty to ' mingle ' strong 

drink. Also in 
Psa. 102. 9; Isa. 19. 14. 



Chaldee.— In Psa. 75. 8, the Targum 
reads mezagath merarthah, 'a mixture 
of bitterness ' ; in Prov. 23. 30, 7nimsak 
is paraphrased baith mizgah, ' a house of 



mixture ' — i. e. a house where a mixed 
drink is provided ; in Cant. 7. 2, mezeg 
is lost in a cloud of allegory; in Isa. 65. 
II, the T. has ' who have mixed for their 
gods a goblet.' In Prov. 9. 2, 5, the 
verbal form is mezagath, ' mixed ' ; and 
in Isa. 5. 22, le-aithrevath, to make 
drunk (or drench) themselves.' 

Greek. — Psa. 75. 8, the Lxx. has 
keras?na, ' mixture ' ; Symmachus has 
ekchutheis 'poured out.' Prov. 23. 30, 
the Lxx. has potoi, ' drinkings ' ; Theo- 
dotion has kerasmata, ' mixtures.' Cant. 
7. 2, the Lxx. krama, ' mixed-liquor ' ; 
Isa. 65. II, kerasma, 'mixture.' In 
Prov. 9. 2, 5, and Isa. 5. 22, the Lxx. 
uses inflections of the verb kerannumi, 
' to mingle. ' 

Latin. — Psa. 75. 8, the V. has 
7nixtu.n1 ; Prov. 23. 30, calices ; and Cant. 
7. 2, pocula, 'cups'; Isa. 65. 1 1, libatis, 
'have made libations.' In Prov. 9. 25, 
and Isa. 5. 22, the verb miscuo, 'to mix,' 
is used. 



7. Ashishah (sometimes written eshishah) signifies some kind of fruit-cake, 
probably a cake of pressed grapes or raisins. It occurs four times, and in each 
case is associated by the A. V. with some kind of drink. 
2 Samuel. 



16. 3 



3- h 



19, a part of a public donative; *a 
flagon of wine ' (A. V.) — ' of wine ' 
in italics. 

1 Chronicles. 
same as above. 

Canticles. 
stay me with flagons ' (A. V. ). 

Hosea. 
flagons of wine' (A. V.); but in 
the margin ' grapes ' is substituted 
for ' wine ' ; the Hebrew being ashi- 
shah anahvim, ' pressed-cakes of 
grapes.' 



Chaldee. — In the first two passages 
the Targum has manthah, ' a portion ' ; 



and in the other two places the para- 
phrase does not follow the text. 

Greek. — In 2 Sam. 6. 19, the Lxx. has 
legation apo leeganou, 'a cake-cooked- 
with-oil from the frying-pan ' = a pan- 
cake or fricasse. In 1 Chron. 16. 3, 
amoriteen, ' a cake ' ; in Cant. 2. 5, mu- 
rois, ' with perfumes ' ; Symmachus, 
anthei, ' on a flower ' ; Aquila, oinanthon 
'with vine-flowers.' In Hos. 3. 1, the 
Lxx. \vas pemmata meta staphidos (Codex 
A, staphidon), ' cakes made with raisins. ' 

Latin.— In 2 Sam. 6. 19, and 2 Chron. 
16. 3, the Vulgate has similam frixam 
oleo, 'a cake-of-fine-flour fried in oil.' 
In Cant. 2. 5, floribus, 'with flowers.' 
In Hos. 3. 1, vinacea uvarum, 'husks 
of grapes.' 



8. Shemarim (pronounced shemahri??i) is derived from shamar, 'to preserve,' 
and has the general signification of things preserved. It occurs five times. In 
Exod. 12. 42, the same word, differently pointed, is twice translated as signifying 
to be kept (observed). 

Psalms. parts of the mixture preserved from 

75. 8, said to be sucked up by the solution = the insoluble dregs or 

wicked; ' dregs ' (A. V.), rather the j drugs. 

53 



4i8 



APPENDIX B. 



Isaiah. 
25. 6 (twice), joined with shemahnim, 
'fat things,' as the provisions of a 
banquet, and indicating dainties, 
answering to our English 'pre- 
serves ' or confections. 
Jeremiah. 
48. II, the dregs of wine, 'preserved' 
by falling to the bottom of the cask; 
'lees '(A. V.). 

Zephaniah. 
1. 12, the same; 'lees' (A. V.). 

Chaldee. — In Psa. 75. 8, the T. has 
'dregs and refuse'; in Isa. 25. 6, the 
paraphrase retains the sense of ' dregs ' 
by representing that though the nations 



expect a luxurious banquet, they will be 
doomed to mortification, ignominy, etc. ; 
in Jer. 48. 11, a cognate word, shenah- 
raib, 'his dregs,' is given; in Zeph. 1. 
12, 'lees' is paraphrased by 'riches.' 

Greek.— Psa. 75. 8, the Lxx. has 
trugias, 'dregs.' Isa. 25. 6, piontai 
oinon, ' they shall drink wine ' ; Sym- 
machus, poton trugion, 'a feast of lees.' 
Jer. 48. 11, doxee, 'glory'; evidently 
another reading of the text or a para- 
phrase. Zeph. 1. 12, another reading 
of the text is followed. 

Latin. — The Vulgate, in Psa. 75. 8, 
hasyfex, 'feculence'; in Isa. 25. 6, vin~ 
demia, 'vintage produce'; in Jer. 48. 
11, fcecibus, 'in his dregs'; Zeph. 1. 12, 
fcecibus. 



9. Mamtaqqim is derived from m.ahthaq, 'to suck,' and denotes 'sweetnesses. 



It is applied to the mouth (Cant. 5. 
16) as full of sweet things. In Neh. 8. 
10, it is said, ' Go your way, eat the fat, 
and drink the sweet ' — mamtaqqim, 
' sweetnesses '=sweet drinks. The Lxx. 



has glukasmata, 'sweet things,' and the 
V. mulsum, ' drink sweet as honey. ' 
[Mathaq is most probably allied to the 
Saxon metheg and metheglin, liquid pre- 
parations from honey. ] 



10. Shakar (sometimes written shechar, shekar) signifies 'sweet drink,' ex- 
pressed from fruits other than the grape, and drunk in an unfermented or fermented 
state. It occurs in the Old Testament twenty-three times. 

Leviticus. 
10. 9, forbidden along with yayin to the 



priests while officiating. 
Numbers. 
6. 3, forbidden to the Nazarites. 
6. 3, vinegar of, forbidden to Nazarites. 

28. 7, to be offered as a libation to the 
Lord (apparently here denoting the 
sweet juice of the grape). 

Deuteronomy. 
14. 26, to be bought (probably in lieu of 
yitzhar, orchard-fruit). 

29. 6, not drunk in the wilderness. 

Judges. 
13. 4, 7, 14, forbidden to Samson's 
mother. 

1 Samuel. 
I. 15, its use disclaimed by Hannah. 

Psalms. 
69. 12, the drinkers of it (A. V., 
'drunkards ') mocked the Psalmist. 
Proverbs. 
20. I, pronounced 'raging.' 
31. 4, forbidden to princes. 
31. 6, the use of, by those ready to 



perish, causing forgetfulness of their 

misery. 

Isaiah. 

5. 11, woe to those following after it. 
5. 22, woe to those mingling it. 
24. 9, becoming bitter to the drinker. 

28. 7 (thrice), causing the priest and 
prophet to err and stray. 

29. 9, staggering in the absence of it. 
56. 12, the impious filling themselves 

with it. 

MlCAH. 

2. II, the subject of false prophesying. 

Shakar is, uniformly translated ' strong 
drink' in the A. V., except in Numb. 
28. 7, where it is rendered ' strong wine '; 
and in Psa. 69. 12, where instead of 
'drinkers of shakar,' the A. V. reads 
'drunkards.' 



Chaldee. — In the Targum shakar is 
usually rendered khamar attiq, 'old 
wine, ' a rendering indubitably erroneous; 
but other renderings are as follows : — 
Marvai, 'strong drink,' in Lev. 10. 9; 
Psa. 69. 12. Khamar bekhir, Jerusalem 



APPENDIX B. 



419 



Targum of Numb. 28. 7, where On- 
kelos and Jonathan have khamar attiq. 
Marath, 'pure,' or 'neat,' Jonathan's 
rendering in Deut. 29. 6 ; and sikrah, in 
Prov. 20. I. 

Greek. — The Lxx. gives shakar the 
Greek garb of sikera (except in Judg. 
13. 4, where Codex B, metkusma, ' strong 
drink): metkusma, I Sam. I. 15 ; Micah 
2. II : oinon, 'wine,' Psa. 69. 12; Prov. 
31. 4 : methee, ' strong liquor, ' or ' drunk- 
enness,' Prov. 20. 1; 31. 6; Isa. 27. 8 
(once, but Codex A has sikera thrice). 

Of other Greek versions preserved, 
the usual renderings are metkusma, 



'strong drink,' except Theodotion, Isa. 
28. 7; metkee (once), 56. 12 [a verse 
absent from the Lxx. version] 

Latin. — The common rendering of 
the Vulgate is sicera, an adaptation from 
the Hebrew or Greek, except omne quod 
inebriare potest, ' whatever is able to 
inebriate,' in Lev. 10. 9; Numb. 6. 3; 
I Sam. 1. 15 : qualibet alia potio, 'any 
other drink,' in Numb. 6. 3 (second 
clause): potio, 'drink,' in Isa. 24. 9: 
vinum, 'wine,' in Numb. 28. 7; Psa. 
69. 12: ebrietas, 'drunkenness,' in Prov. 
20. 1; 31. 4; Isa. 5. 11; 5. 12; 28. 7 
(thrice); 29. 9; 56. 12. 



II. 



Hebrew Words descriptive of Vineyard, Vine, etc. 



[Vineyard] Kerem (pi. Kerah- 
MIM). — A term applied at first to culti- 
vated land appropriated to the growth of 
fruit-bearing plants, and at length spe- 
cifically to ground set apart for the cul- 
ture of the vine, though probably down 
to a late period the more general meaning 
was not absent from the word. It is 
translated ' vineyard ' in the A. V. in 
Gen. 9. 20; Exod. 22. 5 (twice); 23. II ; 
Lev. 19. 10 (twice); 25. 3; 25. 4; Numb. 
16. 14 [Heb. sing, 'vineyard']; 20. 17 
[Heb. sing, 'vineyard']; 21. 22 [Heb. 
sing. ' vineyard ' ] ; 22. 24 ; Deut. 6. 1 1 ; 

20. 6; 22. 9 (twice); 23. 24; 24. 21; 28. 
30; 28. 39; Josh. 24. 13; Judg. 9. 27; 
"• 335 14- 5 5 15- 5; 21. 20; 21. 21; 
I Sam. 8. 14; 8. 15; 22. 7; 1 Kings 21 ; 
I; 21. 2 (twice); 21. 6 (twice); 21. 7; 

21. 15; 21. 16; 21. 18; 2 Kings 5. 26; 
18. 32; 19. 29; 1 Chron. 27. 27 (twice); 
Neh. 5.3; 5.4; 5. 5; 5. 11; 9. 25; Job 
24. 6 (rendered 'vintage ' in A. V.) ; 24. 
18; Psa. 107. 37; Prov. 24. 30; 31. 16; 
Eccles. 2. 4; Cant. 1. 6 (twice); 1. 14; 
2. 15 (twice, and both times 'vines' in 
the A. V.); 7. 12; 8. 11 (twice); 8. 
12; Isa. I. 8; 3. 14; 5. I (twice); 5. 

3; 5- 4; 5- 5; 5- 7; 5- 10; 16. 10; 
27. 2; 36. 17; 37. 30; 65. 21; Jer. 12; 
10; 31. 5; 32. 15; 35. 7; 35. 9; 39. 
10; Ezek. 28. 26; Hos. 2. 15; Amos 
4. 9; 5. 11; 5. 17; 9. 14; Micah 1. 6; 
Zeph. 1. 13. [See Shedamoth and 
Kannah.] The A. V. includes kerem 
as part of a proper name in Neh. 3. 14, 
Beth-haccerem ; Jer. 6. 1, Beth-haccerem 
[literally, baith-hak- kerem, ' a house of 
the vineyard']. From Kerem comes — 



[ Vineyard-man] Koram (pi. Ko- 
ramim), ' a vineyarder,' a man employed 
about a vineyard. In the A. V. trans- 
lated 'vinedresser' in 1 Kings 25. 12; 
2 Chron. 26. 10; Isa. 61. 15; Jer. 52. 
16; Joel 1. 11. 

[Vine-field] Shedamoth, used ap- 
parently to designate fields planted with 
vines, in Deut. 32. 32; Isa. 16. 8; 
Hab. 3.17. 

Kannah is translated 'vineyard' in 
Psa. 80. 15, but probably signifies ' a 
plant.' Gesenius translates it 'protect 
thou.' 

[Vine] Gephen (pi. Gephanim) 
strictly signifies ' a twig,' from gapknan, 
'to be bent,' and hence applied to the 
vine as the most valuable of flexile 
plants. It is so applied in the A. V. 
as follows : — Gen. 40. 9; 40. 10; 49. 11 ; 
Numb. 6. 4 ; 20. 5 [Hebrew, ' the vine ' ] ; 
Deut 8. 8 [Hebrew, ' the vine '] ; 32. 32 
(twice); Judg. 9. 12; 9. 13; 13. 14; 
I Kings 4. 25 ; 2 Kings 4. 39 \_gephen 
sadeh, ' a vine of the field '=a wild vine]; 
18. 31; Job 15. 33; Psa. 78 47; 80.8; 80. 
14; 105. S3; 128. 3; Cant. 2. 13; 6. 11; 
7. 8; 7. 12; Isa. 7. 23; 16. 8; 16. 9; 
24. 7; 32. 12; 34. 4; 36. 16; Jer. 2. 21 ; 
5. 17; 6. 9; 8. 13; 48. 32; Ezek. 15. 2; 
15.6; 17. 6(twice); 17. 7; 17.8; 19. 
10; Hos. 2. 12; 10. I; 14. 7; Joel I. 7; 
1. 12; 2. 22; Micah 4. 4; Hab. 3. 17; 
Hag. 2. 19; Zech. 3. 10; 8. 12; Mai. 
3. 11. [See also Soraq and Zemorah.] 
'Vine' is superadded in the A. V. in 
Lev. 25. 5, 11. 

Soraq is supposed to be derived from 
saraq, 'to interweave'; hence soraq, a 



420 



APPENDIX B. 



collection of shoots and tendrils. Some 
regard it as applied to a peculiar and 
pre-eminent species of vine. It occurs 
Gen. 49. 11, ' choice vine' ; Judg. 16. 4, 
'Sorek,' the name of a 'valley' or ra- 
vine; Isa. 5. 2, ' the choicest vine ' ; 16. 
8, ' the principal plants ' ; Jer. 2. 21, 'a 
noble vine.' 

[Vine-branch] Zemorah, derived 
from zamar, 'to pluck' or 'prune,' is 
supposed to denote a vine-branch In 
Numb. 13, 23, 'a branch'; Isa. 17. 
10, 'strange slips'; but in Ezek. 8. 17 
and 15. 2 no definite kind of branch 
seems intended. From zamar also 
comes — 

[Vine-knife] Mazmorah, the sharp 
instrument used for detaching the ripe 
grapes from the vine, translated 'pruning- 
hook,'Isa. 2. 4; 18. 5; Joel 3. 10; Micah 

4-3- 

Maggol (from nagal, 'to cut') is 
translated 'sickle' in Jer. 50. 16 ; Joel 
3. 13. 

[Vine-blossom] SemadarIs rendered 
'tender grape' in the A. V., but may, 
perhaps, be more properly rendered 
'vine-blossom.' It occurs Cant. 2. 13; 
2. 15; 7. 12. 

Natz, 'flower,' applied to the vine, 
Gen. 40. 12, and rendered ' its blossoms 
flourished.' 

Parakh, 'to bud,' applied to the 
vine, Gen. 40. 12, 'budded'; Cant. 6. 
II; 7. 12, 'flourish'; Hos. 14. 7, 
'grow.' 

[A GRAPE-BERRY] GARGAR OCCUrs 

Isa. 17. 6. 

[Grape] Anab (pi. ANABIM — accord- 
ing to the Masorite pointing anahv, pi. 
anakvim) is derived from a root ' to bind 
together ' ; hence the anab or anahv de- 
noted a number of grape-berries joined 
together = a little bunch. In the He- 
brew Bible the singular form occurs but 
once (and then in a collective sense), 
Deut. 32. 14, and the A. V. uniformly 
renders anabim by ' grapes ' : — Gen. 40. 
10; 40. 11; 49. 11; Lev. 25. 5; Numb. 
6. 3 (twice); 13. 20; 13. 23; Deut. 23. 
24; 32. 14; 32. 32 (twice); Neh. 13. 
15; Isa. 5. 2; 5. 4; Jer. 8. 13; Hos. 3. 
I; 9. 10; Amos 9. 13. In Hos. 3. 
I anabim is translated 'wine,' but the 
margin gives correctly 'grapes.' 

In the following passages the word 
' grape ' or ' grapes ' is supplied by the 
English translators, but does not occur in 
the Hebrew: — Judg. 8. 2; 9 17; Lev. 
19. 10 ; 25 11; Deut. 24. 31 ; 28. 30 ; 28. 
39; Job 15. 33; Cant. 7. 7; Isa. 5. 2; 
5. 4 [after 'wild']; 17. 6; 18.5; Jer. 25. 



30; 31. 29, 30; 49. 9; Ezek. 19. 12; 

Obad 5. 

[Cluster] Eshkol (pi. Eshkoloth) 
primarily denoted a stalk of grapes, and 
thence 'a cluster, ' i. e. an accumulation of 
the smaller bunches, anakvim. The A. 
V. translates eshkol, eshkoloth, 'cluster,' 
' clusters,' in Gen 40. 10 ; Numb. 13. 23 ; 
13. 24; Deut. 32. 32; Cant. 1. 14, 'a 
cluster of camphire ' (cypress); 7. 7; 7. 
8; Isa. 65, 8; Micah 7. 1. In 1 Sam. 
25. 18 and 30. 12 the word ' clusters ' 
is supplied by the English translators. 
Eshkol is retained as a proper name, 
'Eshcol,' in Gen. 14. 13, 24; Numb. 
13. 23; 13. 24; 32. 9; Deut. 1. 24. 

[Unripe-Grapes] Boser and Baser 
are used to designate a collection of grapes 
still unripe, though fully formed. The 
A. V. rendering is once 'unripe grape,' 
and otherwise 'sour grape,' — Job. 15. 
33; Isa. 18 5; Jer. 31. 29, 30; Ezek. 
18.2. 

[Vine-fruit] Tirosh, the natural 
fruit of the vine, taken collectively. In 
the order of growth came the budding, 
perakh ; then the blossom, zemadar ; 
next the unripe fruit, boser ; and lastly 
the fully formed fruit, tirosh. In the 
order of qiiantity came the single berries, 
gargarim ; the grape-bunches, anabi?n ; 
the grape-clusters (composed of bunches), 
eshkoloth ; and the collective produce of 
the vine, tirosh. Tirosh, erroneously 
translated 'wine' and 'new wine' in the 
A. V., occurs thirty-eight times, for which 
see page 414. 

[Raisins, dried grapes] Tzimmu- 
qim, from tzamaq, 'to dry up,' signi- 
fies, literally, dried things, and is trans- 
lated 'clusters of raisins' in I Sam. 25. 
18 ; 30 12; and 'bunches of raisins' in 
2 Sam. 16. I ; I Chron. 12. 40. 

[Cakes, made of pressed grapes or 
raisins] Ashishah (pi. Ashishoth), 
incorrectly translated in the A. V. 
'flagon' and 'flagon of wine,' occurs 
2 Sam 6. 19; I Chron 16. 3; Cant. 2. 
5; Hos. 3. 1. See page 417. 

[The Vintage] Batzir, from bahtzar, 
'to cut off,' signified the act or time of 
gathering grapes, which was usually per- 
formed by cutting them from the vine. 
The word occurs and is rendered ' vint- 
age ' in the A. V Lev. 26. 5 (twice); 
Judg. 8. 2; Isa. 24 13; 32. 10; Jer. 48. 
32; Micah 7. I; Zech. II. 2. 

[In Isa. 16. 10 the word 'vintage' is 
supplied by the translators. In Job 24 
6 ' vintage ' is the rendering, not of 
batzir, but of kerem.~\ 

The verb bahlzer, applied to the vint- 



APPENDIX B. 



421 



age, occurs also in Lev. 25. 5; 25. II; 
Deut 24. II ; Judg. 9. 27. 

Qatzir, generally translated 'harvest' 
in A. V., is applied to the vintage in 
Joel 3. 13 (probably also Joel I. 11). 

[Vintager, grape-gatherer] Botzar 
(pi. Botzerim) was a cutter (z. e. gath- 
erer) of grapes at the time of the 
vintage, batzir. The A. V. translates 
by ' grape-gatherer ' in Jer. 6. 9 ; 49. 9 ; 
Obad. 5. 

[Grape-gleaning] Ollaloth, used 
of the vintage season, Judg. 8. 2 ; Isa. 1 7. 
6; Jer. 49. 9; Obad. 5, where the A.V. 
has ' some grapes, ' but ' gleanings ' in 
the margin. 

The verbal form occurs Lev. 19. 10; 
Deut. 24. 21 ; Jer. 6. 9 (twice). The 
verb lahqash is found Job 24. 6, and is 
translated 'they gather,' but some pre- 
fer ' they glean. ' 

[Wine-press] Yeqeb (or Yeqev), 
the general name for cavity, coop, or 
'hollow place' where the grapes were 
first brought together, then trodden, and 
their juice collected. The A. V. renders 
it press, wine-press, and wine-vat, and 
once 'wine,' Deut. 16. 13. It occurs 
Numb. 18. 27; 18. 30; Deut. 15. 14; 
16. 13; Judg. 7. 25; 2 Kings 6. 27; Job 



24. II; Prov. 3. 10; Isa. 5. 2; 16. 10; 
Jer. 48. ss; Hos. 9. 2; Joel 2. 24; 3. 
13; Hag. 2. 16; Zech. 14. 10. 

Gath, ' a place of pleasure ' = where 
grapes and olives are trodden, Judg. 6. 1 1 ; 
Neh. 13. 15; Isa. 63. 2; Lam. 1. 15; Joel 
3. 13. [See also Purah and Yeqeb.] 

As the name of a Philistine city, 
'Gath,' it occurs Josh. 13. 3; 1 Sam. 
6. 17; 21. 11; 1 Kings 2. 39, 40. As 
included in the names of three Hebrew 
towns, — (1) Gath-hepher (wine-press of 
the well), Josh. 10. 13, where Jonah was 
born; (2) Gath-rimmon (press of the 
pomegranate), Josh. 19. 45 ; and (3) 
Githaim (two wine-presses), Neh. 11.33. 

Purah, from the root, 'to break,' 
occurs Isa. 63. 3, A. V. 'winepress'; 
Hag. 2. 16, A. V, 'press,' where some 
regard it as a denomination of measure. 

[Grape-treader] Dorak, from dah- 
rak, to tread, signifies 'a treader,' and 
is applied to the treader of grapes in the 
wine-press, Neh. 13. 15 ; Isa. 16. 10 
(where the A. V. reads ' treaders ' in- 
stead of 'treader'); Jer. 25, 30. 

The verb is used in reference to tread- 
ing grapes in Judg. 9. 27; Job 24. 11 ; 
Isa. 63. 2, 3; Jer. 48. 33; Lam. I. 15; 
Micah 6. 15. 



III. 

Hebrew Words for Leaven (ferment), things Leavened (fermented), 
Vinegar, and Unleavened (unfermented) things. 



1. Seor, derived from a root 'to boil 
up,' 'to ferment,' denotes a substance 
fermenting, or capable of producing fer- 
mentation. In the A. V. it is trans- 
lated 'leaven' in Exod. 12. 15; 12. 19; 
13. 7 ; Lev. 2. 1 1 ; and ' leavened bread ' 
in Deut. 16. 4. 

2. Khamatz, both noun and verb, 
denoting whatever is undergoing or has 
undergone the fermenting process. The 
A. V. translates by 'leavened bread' 
in Exod. 12. 15; 13. 3; 13. 7; 23. 18; 
Deut. 16. 3 ; by ' that which is leavened' 
in Exod. 12. 19; by 'leavened' in Exod. 
12. 20; 12. 34; 12. 39; Lev. 7. 13 
[where the Hebrew is lekhem khamatz, 
* bread leavened ' ]; Hos. 7. 4 ; by ' leaven' 
in Exod. 34. 25 ; Lev. 2. 11 ; 6. 17; 23. 17; 
Amos 4. 5 ; by ' was grieved ' in Psa. 73. 
21. Analogous words (with a different 
pointing) are khamotz, translated ' op- 
pressed ' in Isa. 1. 17; khomatz, 'cruel,' 



in Psa. 71. 4; khamatz, ' dyed,' in Isa. 
63. 1 ; and khamitz, 'clean,' in Isa. 30. 

24, where something pungent is indicated. 

3. Khometz, 'fermented drink,' is 
applied to what has undergone the acetous 
fermentation, and in the A. V. is trans- 
lated ' vinegar ' in Numb. 6. 3 (twice) ; 
Ruth 2. 4; Psa. 69. 21; Prov. 10. 26; 

25. 20. 

4. Matzah, pi. Matzoth, signifies 
' that which is sweet,' and is contrastively 
used to distinguish unleavened articles 
from those that have undergone fer- 
mentation. In the A. V. it is translated 
' unleavened bread ' (though the Hebrew 
has the plural form) in Gen. 19. 3; 
Exod. 12. 8; 12. 15; 12. 17; 12. 18; 
12.20; 13. 6; 13. 7; 23. 15 (twice); 
29. 23; 34. 18 (twice); Lev. 6. 16; 8. 
2; 8. 26; 23. 6 (twice); Numb. 6. 15 
(twice); 6. 17; 9. 11 ; 28. 17; Deut. 16. 
3; 16. 8; 16. 16; 1 Sam. 28. 24; 



422 



APPENDIX B. 



2 Kings 23. 9; 2 Chron. 8. 13; 30. 13; 
30. 21 ; Ezra 6. 22 ; Ezek. 45. 21. It is 
translated ' unleavened cake ' or ' cakes ' 
in Numb. 6. 19; Josh. 5. 11 ; Judg. 6. 
19; 6. 20; 6. 21 (twice). It is trans- 
lated ' unleavened ' in connection with 



other Hebrew words translated 'cakes,' 
'bread,' 'wafers,' or 'fine flour,' in 
Exod. 12. 39; 29. 2 (thrice); Lev. 2. 4; 
2. 5; 7. 12 (twice); 8. 26; Numb. 6. 
19; I Chron. 23. 29. It is translated 
'without leaven ' in Lev. 10. 12. 



IV. 



Hebrew Words translated Drunken, Drunkenness, and Drunkard. 



1. Shakrah, 'fulness,' occurs in 
Hag. 1. 6, ain le-shakrah, rendered in 
the A. V. ' ye are not filled with drink ' ; 
literally, 'not to fulness' (or reple- 
tion). 

2. Shahkar — connected as root or 
derivative with shakar, ' sweet drink ' — 
strictly implies, as Gesenius states, 'to 
drink to the full,' generally with an im- 
plied sweetness of the article consumed, 
whether the sweet juice of the grape or 
other fruits. Whenever the juice had 
fermented, or had become intoxicating 
by drugs, this plentiful use would lead 
to intoxication, and give to the verb the 
secondary sense of inebriation in the 
drinker. Inebriation, however, must not 
be inferred unless the context suggests 
such a condition. It is translated 
'drunk,' 'drunken,' 'drunken man,' or 
'drunkard,' in the A. V. in Gen. 9. 21 ; 
Deut. 32. 42; 1 Sam. 1. 14; 25. 36; 
2 Sam. II. 13; Job 12. 25 ; Psa. 107. 27; 
Prov. 26. 9; Isa. 19. 14; 24. 20; 28. 1; 
28. 3; 29. 9; 49. 26; 51. 21; 63. 6; 
Jer. 23. 9; 25. 27; 48. 26; 51. 7; 51. 
39; 51. 57; Lam. 4. 21; Joel 1. 5; 
Nah. 3. 11 ; Hab. 2. 15. It is translated 
'were merry ' in Gen. 43. 34; 'drink 
abundantly ' in Cant. 5. I. [In Psa. 69. 
12, where the A. V. gives 'drunkards,' 
the Hebrew is 'drinkers of shakar. , ~\ 

3. Shikkor (fern, shikkorah, 'drunk,' 
occurs in I Sam. I. 13; I Kings 16. 9; 
20. l6. 

4. Shikkahron, or Shikkron, 
'drunkenness,' occurs Jer. 13. 13; Ezek. 



2 3« 33 ; 39- J 9 [where the A. V. has ' till 
ye be drunken ' — literally, ' to drunken- 
ness ']. In Josh. 15. II, Shikron appears 
as the name of a town, ' Shicron.' 

5. Rahvah signifies ' to drink largely,' 
'to be filled with drink,' without the 
reference contained in shahkar to the 
sweetness of the liquid imbibed. In the 
A. V. it is rendered ' made drunk ' in 
Jer. 46. 10 and Lam. 3. 15 ; but other 
renderings, expressive of simple abund- 
ance, are given in Psa. 23. 5 ; 36. 8; 65. 
10 ['abundantly']; 66. 12 ['wealthy ']; 
Prov. 5. 19 ['satisfy']; 7. 18; 1 1. 15 
(twice); Isa. 16. 9; 34. 5 ['bathed']; 34. 

7; 43- 2 4; 55- !o; J er - 3 1 - w> 31. 2 5- 

6. Rahveh. — This adjective is ren- 
dered ' drunkenness ' — margin, ' the 
drunken' — in Deut. 29 19,= drink-hard; 
'watered' in Isa. 58. 11 ; Jer. 31. 12. 

7. Ri (an abbreviation of Revi) is 
rendered 'watering ' in Job 37. II. 

8. Sahvah (connected with Soveh) 
signifies 'to suck up,' 'to soak.' In the 
A. V. it is rendered 'drunkard,' Deut. 
21. 20; 'bibbers,' Prov. 23. 10 ['wine- 
bibbers ' — soz'ai-yayin, ' soakers - of - 
wine ' ] ; ' drunkard,' Prov. 23. 21 ; 'we 
will fill ourselves with,' Isa. 56. 12; 
' Sabeans' — margin, 'drunkards,' — Ezek 
23. 42; 'drunken' and 'drunkards' in 
Nah. I. 10. 

. 9. Shethi (from shahthah, 'to drink') 
is translated ' drunkenness ' in Eccles. 10. 
17, where the sense seems to require 
some general term, such as ' carousing ' 
or 'revelry.' 



V. 

Hebrew Words descriptive of the Nature and Effects of Intoxicat- 
ing Drink. 

2. 5, 'he transgresseth by wine,' — rather, 
'wine is a defrauder.' 
Dahlaq, to burn, inflame. Isa. 5. II, 



Avoi, sorrow. Prov. 23. 29, 'who 
hath sorrow ? ' 

Bahla, to swallow down. Isa. 28. 7, 
'they are swallowed up of wine.' 

Bogad, deceiving, defrauding. Hab. 



wine inflames them. 
Hahmah, to rage. Prov. 20. 1, 



strong 



APPENDIX B. 



423 



drink is raging' ; Zech. 9. 15, 'and they 
shall make a noise as through wine,' — 
better, ' they shall rage as wine.' 

Gahash, to shake, reel. Jer. 25. 16, 
' and they shall be moved.' 

Halal, to trill, sing, shout, rave. Jer. 
25, 16, ' and they shall be mad ' ; Jer. 51. 
7, ' the nations are mad.' 

Khahgag, * to be giddy.' Psa. 107. 27, 
• they reel to and fro.' 

Khallah, to be sick (ill). Hos. 7. 5, 'the 
princes have made him sick.' See below. 

Khaklihith, redness, lividness. Prov. 
23. 29, 'who hath redness of eyes?' 
(livid circles round the eyes). 

Khamah, inflaming heat, such as is 
produced by poison, and symbolical of 
rage, fury. Deut. 32. 33, 'their wine 
is the poison of dragons'; Isa. 51. 17, 
'the cup of his fury '/ Isa. 51.22, 'the 
cup of my fury* ; Isa. 63. 6, 'I will 
make them drunk with my anger ' / Jer. 
25. 15, ' take the winecup of this fury ' ; 
Jer. 51. 39, 'in their heat'' ; Hos. 7. 5, 
'the princes have made him sick with 
bottles of wine' (should be 'with in- 
flaming-heat of wine'); Hab. 2. 15, 
' that puttest thy bottle to him ' (should 
be ' pouring out thy inflaming-drink 1 ). 

\_Kha7nah occurs in the following other 
places: — Deut. 32. 24, 'the poison of 
serpents of the dust ' ; Job 6. 4, ' the 
poison drinketh up my spirit ' ; Psa. 58. 
4, ' their poison is like the poison of a 
serpent ' ; Psa. 140. 3, ' the poison of 
adders is under their lips.'] 

Latz, a mocker, scorner. Prov. 20. 
I, ' wine is a mocker,' or ' scorner.' 
Midrahmim, contentions, strifes. Prov. 

23, 29, ' who hath contentions ? ' 
Nakhash, serpent. Prov. 23. 32, ' it 

biteth like a serpent.' 

Nua, to sway to and fro, to stag- 
ger. Psa. 107. 27, ' and stagger ' ; Isa. 

24. 20, 'reel to and fro ' (lit. 'reeling,' 



' shall reel ') ; Isa. 29. 9, ' they stagger, 
but not with strong drink.' 

Oi and hoi, woe, lamentation. Prov. 
23. 29; Isa. 5. 11; Isa. 5. 22; Isa. 28. 
I ; Hab. 2. 15. 

Petzahim, wounds. Prov. 23. 29, 
' who hath wounds without cause ? ' 

Phahrash, to pierce. Prov. 23. 32, 
'and stingcth (pierceth) like an adder.' 

Raal, trembling. Zech. 12. 2, 'a 
cup of trembling. ' [See taralah.~\ 

Posh, gall, poppy* Deut. 32. 32, 
' grapes of gall ' ; Deut. 32. 32, ' venom 
(gall) of serpents'; Psa. 69. 21, 'they 
gave me also gall for my meat.' 

Shahgag, to go astray, to trans- 
gress. Prov. 20. 1, ' and whosoever is 
deceived by it is not wise ' ; Isa. 28. 7, 
' they have erred through wine ; . . . 
the priest and the prophet have erred 
through strong drink ; they err in 
vision.' 

Shammah, desolation ; Shemahmah, 
astonishment. Ezek. 23. 33, 'the cup 
of desolation and astonishment.' 

Shuk, to bite. Prov. 23. 32, ' at the 
last it biteth like a serpent.' 

Siakh, brawling, babbling. Prov. 23. 
29, ' who hath babbling ? ' 

Tahah, to wander, to stray. Job 21. 
25, 'he maketh them to stagger like a 
drunken man'; Isa. 19. 14, 'they have 
caused Egypt to err, ... as a drunken 
man staggereth in his vomit ' ; Isa. 28. 
7, 'through strong drink they are out 
of the way; . . . they are out of the 
way.' 

Taralah, reeling, trembling. Psa. 
60. 3, ' wine of astonishment ' ; Isa. 51. 
17, 22, 'the cup of trembling.' 

Tziphoni, a viper. Prov. 23. 32, ' it 
stingeth like an adder (viper).' 

Yahgon, sorrow. Ezek. 32. 33, 
'thou shalt be filled with drunkenness 
and sorrow.' 



VI. 



Other Hebrew Words explained in the Notes. 
[The figures refer to the pages of the Commentary. ] 



Agganoth, bowls, 165. 
Ahdam, to be red, 136, 180. 
Ahiph, languishing, 114. 
Ahlaz, to exult, 200. 
Ahmah, weariness, sorrow, 143. 
Ahmal, to languish, 165, 226. 
Ahrah, to be naked, 204. 



Ahsaph, to scrape together, to gather, 

52, 56, 198. 
Ahval, to hang down=to mourn, 165. 
Ahvar, to cross over, to overwhelm, 187. 
Ain, eye or fountain, 22, 65, 136, 137. 
Anah, wormwood, 203. 
Anus him, fined ones, 229. 



424 



APPENDIX B. 



Ateretk, crown, wreath, 169. 

Avah, to desire, 54, 142. 

Bahsar (or vahsar), flesh, 135, 147, 

212. 
Bakhurim, young men, 246. 
Bar, fine corn, 227. 
Bari, fat, 212. 
Bashal, to ripen, 17. 
Bath, a measure equal to *]% gallons 

English, 98, 102, 159. 
Beer (or baar), a well, 48, 87, 130. 
Belen, belly, 1 15. 

Berakhah (or verakhali), blessing, 182. 
Bethuloth, maidens, 240. 
Betishim, wild or vile (grapes), 158. 
Bikurim, firsts = first-ripe, 45. 
Bitam, taste, counsel, decree, 214. 
Borek, pit, cistern, I, 130. 
Dahgan, corn, 15, 52, 53, 56, 93, 100, 

IO4, I06, 107, II4, 117, I32, 189, 202, 
217, 2l8, 222, 227, 244, 246. 

Dahm, blood, 22, 33, 61, 64, 65, 1 18, 

176, 198, 206, 209. 
Debash (or devash), honey, whether of 

bees or made from grape-juice, 20, 26, 

34, 46, 52, 94, 100, 140, 141, 152. 
Dema, a tear, liquor, 31, 161. 
Devalah, a cake of figs, 83, 96. 
Din, judgment, 142. 
Dodim, loves, 131, 150, 152. 
Gan, a garden, 1 78. 
Gavath, pride, 169. 
Geber, a strong man, 124, 160. 
Goren, the corn-floor, 223. 
Gur, to carry, to assemble, 222. 
Hahlam, to smite, 169. 
Hahrim, mountains, 228, 232. 
Haidad, exaltation, vintage-shouting, 162. 
Hillulim, songs at vintage-time, 71. 
Hin, a measure equal to 12 pints English, 

32, 46, 49- 
Kabod, glory, 141. 

Karmel, Carmel, garden, 94, 99, 162. 
Keli, vessel, 108, 165. 
Keseph, silver, 161. 
Khag, a sacred dance = a feast, xviii, 

56, 76, 98, 99, 100. 101. 
Khak, the palate, 153. 
Khaklili, red, livid, or purple, 22, 136. 
Khakmah, wisdom, 127, 131, 147. 
Khalab (or khahlahv), milk, 21, 26, 46, 

61, 68, 152, 177, 203. 
Khamas, violence, 130. 
Khameth, a bottle, 14. [In Genesis 

only.] 
Khinnahm, for nothing, 136. 
Khisvomoth, inventions, devices, 148. 
Khoakh, a thorn, 142. 
Kohan, priest, 170, 209. 
Kopher, cypress shrub, 150. 
Kos, a cup, 17, 118, 119, 122, 137, 176, 

186, 188, 207, 241. 



Lekhem, bread, 11, 14, 76, 81, 82, 83, 
86, 88, 94, 96, 102, 104, 114, 126, 130, 
148, 149, 164, 174, 214, 244. 

Lua, to swallow down, 233. 

Maasar, tithe, 107. 

Mahal, to cut off, to dilute, 156. 

Mahshak, to draw, to continue, 147. 

Maim, water, 14, 26, 29, 48, 51, 52, 74, 
82, 83, 87, 88, 89, 94, 102, 114, 119, 
140, 141, 156, 157, 164, 234. 

Maishahrim, in straight lines, straightly, 

137, 154 
Masqeh,one who offers drink to another= 

a cup-bearer, 'butler,' 16, 103. 
Matzah, to suck up, 123, 176, 207. 
Mekhaqqaq, decree, 142 
Melaah, fulness, firstfruits, 31, 47, 58. 
Melek, king, 89, 103, 108, 109, no, in, 

112, 142, 221, 234. 
Meni, fortune, 182. 
Merorim, bitter herbs, 45. 
Migdol, watch-tower, 158. 
Mishroth, maceration, 'liquor,' 40. 
Mishteh, time or place of drinking, a 

feast, drink, 12, 82, 101, no,- in, 

112, 113, 160, 167, 186. 
Misraq, vessel, bowl, 231, 245. 
Mood, appointed time, season, 217. 
Nahshak, to bite, 137. 
Nahta, to plant, 8, 51, 59, 67, 124, 232, 

242. 
Nahtaph, to drop down, to prophesy, 

228, 232, 235. 
Nahvi, a prophet, 170. 
Nahzir, a Nazarite, 41, 43, 71, 79, 229. 
Nakhal, a ravine, and in time of rain a 

watercourse, 45, 46, 50, 51, 52, 75, 89, 

127. 
Nasak and Nesek, drink poured out as 

an act of worship (translated in A. V. 

'drink-offering'), 16, 32, 43, 49, 64, 

92, 97, 99, 101, 118, 182, 186, 190, 

210, 223, 226, 227. 
Nather, nitre, i e. potash, 140. 
Nebel (or nevel\ bottle, skin-bag, 80, 

81, 82, 86, 165, 185. 
Nod, bottle, skin-bag, 66, 68, 82. 
Nozlim, streams, 130. 
Nub (or ntiv), to cause to grow, to thrive, 

206. 
Ob (or ov), bottle, 115. 
Oni, affliction, 142. 
Ovad, perishing one, 143. 
Pahthaakh, vent, 1 15. 
Paqqtwth, gourds, cucumbers, 91. 
Pathbag, meat, dainties, 211. 
Pennanim, corals, ' rubies ' ? 203. 
Peri, fruit, 51, 60, 95, 106, 183, 245, 

247. 
Phahratz, to break down, to abound 

with, 129 [not 'overflow']. 
Qahbatz, to collect, to gather, 180. 



APPENDIX B. 



425 



Qaklal, to curse, 71. 

Qahphah, to draw up, to coagulate, 242. 

Qubaath, lowest contents, dregs, 176, 
177. 

Raa, friend, neighbor, 240. 

Raduph, to pursue, 159. 

Rahah, to look, to desire, 136, 137. 

Rahpad, to refresh, 151. 

Raiakh, smell, odor, 151. 

Rashish, firsts = firstfruits, 100. 

Reqakh, spice, 154. 

Rimmon, the pomegranate, 52, 81, 154. 

Risk, poverty, 143. 

Rozenim, weighty men = princes, 142. 

Run, to overcome, 124. 

Sahbah, to soak, to tope, 178. 

Sahdeh, a plain, field, 62, 140, 146, 173, 
247. 

Sahkar, wages, reward, 145 (foot-note), 
163. 

Sahr (sour), leaven, 220. 

Samaakh, to be joyful, to make glad, to 
cheer, 69, 125, 149, 247. 

Saph, a bowl, 247. 

Sarim, princes, 221. 

Shahkol, to bereave, to be sterile, 248. 

Shahqat, to rest, to settle, 199. 

Shahihah, to drink, 9, 15, 21, 41, 43, 59, 
60, 61, 64, 68, 70, 71, 74, 77, 78, 79, 
80, S^, 85, 87, 88, 89, 94, 104, 106, 
in, 113, 114, 120, 122, 127, 131, 140, 
142, 143, 148, 152, 160, 164, 165, 179, 
188, 191, 192, 207, 211, 228, 229, 231, 
232, 236, 240, 241, 242, 243, 245, 248. 

Shemen, oil, 96, 98, 101, 102, 106, 125, 
244. 

Shenath, sleep, 200. 

Shethiah, the drinking, 100. 



Shinnaim, teeth, 132. 

Shiqqui, drinking, 217. 

Shir, a song, 165. 

Shuahlim, foxes, jackals, 152. 

Shuq, abound [not to overflow], 227. 

Simkhah, gladness, pleasure, 96, 1 1 7, 
134, 148, 164. 

Sukkoth, booths, xvii, 156. 

Tahmar, palm tree, 153. 

Tankhiwiim, consolations, 186. 

Tapukhim, apples, 151. 

Tapickoth, perverse things, deceits, 137. 

Theanah, a fig, fig tree, 52, 92, 107, 126, 
151, 184, 241. 

Tivuah, produce (translated ' increase '), 
47, 100. 

Tov.. good, spoken of the heart when 
excited and pleased, 75, 78, 82, 86, 
no, 148. 

Tzemed, pair, yoke, acre, 159. 

Tzenmaah, thirsty one, 61, 121. 

Tzevahkah, outcry, 160. 

Yahbask, to be dried up=to perish, 226. 

Yahshar, straight, upright, 108. 

Yevul, produce, 241. 

Yitzhar, olive-and-orchard-fruit (trans- 
lated 'oil'), 52, 53, 56, 94, 100, 104, 
106, 107, 189, 217, 218, 227, 244. 

Zahakv, gold, 108. 

Zahroth, strange woman, 137. 

Zaith, olive, oliveyard, 31, 52, 67, 74, 
81, 91, 94, 114, 128, 241. 

Zaker, memorial, 224. 

Zarorim, pulse, 212. 

Zenuth, fornication, 219. 

Zoaphim, sad, 'worse liking,' 212. 

Zolal, spendthrift, waster, glutton, 57, 
135- 



THE NEW TESTAMENT. 
I. 

Greek Words translated Wine, Strong Drink, and Vinegar. 



Gleukos, sweet- wine. It occurs once : 

being 'full of it.' 
Oinos, wine = the juice of the grape. It 

Matthew. 
9. 17 (thrice), new wine {oinos neos) not 

to be put into old, closed skin-bags, 

but into new ones. 
[27. 34, the received Greek text has oxos, 

mingled with gall, as offered to 

Christ on the cross, and rejected ; but 

several ancient codices read oinos. ] 
Mark. 
2. 22 £four times), new wine not to be 

put into old, closed skin -bags, but 

into new ones. 

54 



— Acts 2. 13, the disciples charged with 



occurs thirty- two times. 
15. 23, myrrhed wine offered to Christ 
on the cross, but rejected, 

Luke. 

1. 15, prediction that John the Baptist 
should drink neither wine nor strong 
drink. 

5. 37, 38 (thrice), new wine not to be put 
into old skin-bags, but into new ones. 

7. 33, John came drinking no wine. 

10. 34, the good Samaritan poured into 
the wounds of the half-killed trav- 
eler oil and wine. 



426 



APPENDIX B. 



John. 
2. 3, wine deficient at the marriage feast 

at Can a. 
2. 9, the ruler of the feast tasted the wine 

made from water. 

2. io, the practice of presenting choice 

wine {oinos kalos) first. 

1. io, the bridegroom charged with keep- 

ing the choice wine till the last. 

4. 46, a reference to the place where the 

water was made wine. 
Romans. 
14. 21, good not to drink wine when it 
causes a brother to stumble. 
Ephesians. 

5. 18, not to be drunk (surcharged) with 

wine, in which is dissoluteness. 
1 Timothy. 

3, 8, deacons not to be given to much 

wine (oino polio) 

5. 23, Timothy to use a little wine (pligo 

oino) medicinally. 
Titus. 

2. 3, the older women not to be given to 

much wine. 

Revelation. 

6. 6, the growing wine. 



14. 8, Babylon's wine of the wrath (heat) 

of her fornication. 
14. 10, the wine of the wrath of God. 
16 19, the cup of the wine of the Divine 

wrath. 

2, Babylon making the people drunk 
with the wine of her fornication. 

3, Babylon's wine of the wrath (heat) 
of her fornication. 

13, with food and luxuries. 

15, the wine-press. 
[In various texts oinos is understood, 
though not actually written. This is 
noticeably the case in Luke 5. 39, where 
it is thrice implied in conjunction with 
the adjectives 'old' and 'new.'] 



Of compounds into which the word 
OINOS enters we have the following : — 

Oinopotees, a wine-drinker, one ad- 
dicted to wine, Matt. II. 19, and Luke 

7- 34- 

Paroinos, near to wine, a wine-guest, 
present at wine-parties, I Tim. 3. 3, and 
Titus I. 7. 

Oinophlugiais, 'to excesses of wine,' 
not indulged in by Christians, I Pet. 4. 2. 



SiKERA, strong drink, occurs once — Luke I. 25, in the angel's prediction con- 
cerning John the Baptist's abstinence from wine and strong drink. 

Oxos, sour wine {oinos, 'wine,' understood) = vinegar, occurs Matt. 27. 28; 
Mark 15. 36; Luke 23. 36; John 19. 29, 30, — all referring to the vinegar presented 
to Jesus on the cross, and received by Him because unmixed with any stupefying 
wine or other drug. 



II. 

Greek Words translated Vine, Vineyard, Fruit of the Vine, Grapes, 

and Clusters. 

1. Ampelos, vine, occurs in the following connections : — 



Matthew. 
26. 29, ' fruit of the vine.' 

Mark. 
14. 25, ' fruit of the vine.' 

Luke. 
22. 18, ' fruit of the vine.' 



John. 
15. 1, 'I am the true vine.' 
15. 4, 'abide in the vine.' 

James. 
3. 12, 'can a vine bear figs ? ' 

Revelation. 
14. 8, 'clusters of the vine of the earth.' 



2. Ampelona, vineyard, occurs in these texts- 



Matthew. 

20. 14, 17, 'laborers into his vineyard.' 

21. 28, ' go work to-day in my vineyard.' 
21. 33, 'a certain man planted a vine- 
yard. ' 

Mark. 

12. 1, 'a certain man planted a vine- 

yard.' 

Luke. 

13. 6, ' a fig tree planted in his vineyard.' 



20. 9, 'a certain man planted a vine- 
yard.' 

1 Corinthians. 

9. 7, 'who planteth a vineyard, and 
eateth not the fruit of it ? ' 

[Ampelourgos, vine- worker, occurs 
Luke 13. 7, and is translated ' the 
dresser of his vineyard.'] 



APPENDIX B. 



427 



3. To geneemata tees ampelou, ' the offspring of the vine,' occurs Matt. 26. 29; 
Mark 14. 25; Luke 22. 18, and is in each place translated 'the fruit of the vine.' 

4. Staphulee, ' grapes,' used as a collective term, and translated ' grapes ' in — 



Matthew. 
6. 16, * neither do men gather grapes 
from thorns.' 

Revelation. 
the grapes are fully ripe ' (pi. staphulai). 



Luke. 
6. 44, 'nor of a bramble-bush do they 
gather grapes.' 



14. 18, 



5. Botrus, 'a cluster,' occurs Rev. 14. 8, 'gather the clusters' (botruos). 



III. 

Greek Words translated Leaven, Unleavened Bread, Drunkenness, 
Drunkard, Drink, Temperance, Sober. 
I. Zumee, leaven, that which causes fermentation. It occurs nine times. 

1 Corinthians. 
5. 6, a little leaven leavens the whole 

lump. 
5. 7, the old leaven to be purged out. 
5. 8, the Lord's Supper to be kept, not 
with the old leaven, the leaven of 
malice and wickedness. 



Matthew. 
13. 13, the kingdom of heaven compared 

to leaven. 
16. 6, the leaven of the Pharisees and 

Sadducees to be avoided. 
16. I2 V the false teaching of the Pharisees 
and Sadducees compared to leaven. 
Mark. 

8. 15, the leaven of the Pharisees and 
Herodians to be shunned. 
Luke. 

12. 1, the leaven of the Pharisees de- 
scribed as hypocrisy. 

13. 21, the kingdom of heaven like to 

hidden leaven. 



Galatians. 
5. 9, a little leaven leavens the whole 
lump. 
The verbal form of this word appears 
in Matt. 13. 33; Luke 13. 21 ; 1 Cor. 5. 
6; and Gal. 5. 9. 



2. Azuma, translated 'unleavened bread,' properly 'unleavened things,' occurs 
in — 



Matthew. 
26. 1 7, ' the feast of unleavened bread ' 
(things). 

Mark. 
14. 21, the first day of unleavened bread 
(things). 

Luke. 
22. 7, the day of unleavened bread 
(things). 



Acts. 
20. 6, the days of unleavened bread 
(things). 

1 Corinthians. 
5. 8, the unleavened bread (things) of 
sincerity and truth. 
'Unleavened,' as a verb, occurs I Cor. 
5-7- 



3. Methee, drunkenness, strictly signifies fulness of drink, and only implies 
inebriation when connected with the use of an intoxicating article. It occurs in 
Luke 21. 33 (plural); Gal. 5. 21 (plural). 

4. Methuon, one drunk, or filled full, occurs Matt. 24. 49 (plural). 

5. Methuosos, drunkard, a hard and deep drinker, occurs 1 Cor. 5. 11, and 6. 
10 (plural). 

6. Methuo,* to be drunk, or filled to the full; and Methusko, to make drunk, 
or 'surcharged,' occur — 

* In many languages, words originally signifying fulness acquired a secondary sense. Surenne's 
French Dictionary (1867) affords this illustration : — 
Soul, e. adj. satiated, cloyed, drunk ; full. 
Saul, s. one's fill, one's belly-full. 
Souler, va. to fill, to satiate ; to fuddle. 



428 



APPENDIX B. 



Luke. 
12 45, 'and to be drunken' (methusko- 
metws). 

John. 
2. io, ' and when men have well drunk ' 
(jnethusthosi). 

Acts. 
2 15, ' these are not drunken ' (inethu- 
onsiti). 

1 Corinthians. 
II 12, 'and another is drunken' (me- 
thuei, filled-out). 



1 Thessalonians. 
5.7,' they that be drunken (methus- 
komenoi) are drunken {methuousiri) 
in the night.' 

Revelation. 
1 7, 2, ' and the inhabitants of the earth 

have been made drunk' (emethus- 

theesari). 
17. 6, ' drunken {methuousan = gorged) 

with the blood of the saints.' 



7. Enkrateia, temperance, self-restraint of the passions. 



Acts. 
24. 25, ' and as he reasoned of righteous- 
ness, temperance.' 

Galatians. 
5. 22, 23, ' but the fruit of the Spirit is 
. . . temperance.' 



2 Peter. 
1. 6, 'and to knowledge (add) tem- 
perance.' 
[The verbal form, enkrateuomai, oc- 
curs I Cor. 9. 25, 'and every man that 
striveth for the mastery is temperate 
(restrains himself) in all things.' 



The adjective enkratee is rendered 'sober ' in Titus I. 8. 



8. Neepho, sober (abstinent). 
1 Thessalonians. 
5. 6. 'let us watch and be sober.' 
5. 8, ' let us who are of the day be sober. ' 

1 Timothy. 

3. 2, let him (the bishop) be vigilant 
(abstinent). 

3. 11, let them (deacons' wives) be sober. 

2 Timothy. 

4. 5, 'but watch thou.' 

Titus. 
2. 2 (of aged men), ' sober.' 

1 Peter. 
I. 13, 'be sober.' 



4. 7, 'be ye therefore sober (sober- 

minded), and watch unto prayer.' 

5. 8, 'be sober.' 

[The word sophron and its connections 
signifying ' sober-minded,' are translated 
'sober,' 'soberly,' in the following pas- 
sages : — Acts 26. 25 ; Rom. 12. 3 ; 2 
Cor. 5. 13; I Tim. 2. 9; 1 Tim. 2. 15; 
I Tim. 3. 2; Titus 2. 4, 12; 1 Peter 4. 
7. In Titus 2. 2, the translation is 
'temperate,' and in ver. 8 it is 'sober- 
minded' — the form that should have 
been uniformly employed.] 



IV. 



Other New Testament Greek Terms explained in the Notes. 



Adeelos, immediately, 334. 
Adokimos, unapproved, rejected, 334. 
Adunatos, one who is unable, 327. 
Agapee, love, love-feast, 339, 348. 
Agonizomai, to struggle, to contend, 333. 
Aiphnidios, unforeseen, 299. 
Aischrokerdees, eager for unjust gain, 368. 
Akataschetos, uncoercible, 381. 
Aleetheia, truth, 328. 
Aleeihinos, true, real, 310. 
Alenron, fine meal, flour, 269. 
Amphoteros, both, 265, 293. 
Anthropos, a man, 267, 303, 324. 
Antleema, a bucket, 309. 



Antleo, to draw out, 302. 
Apecho, to hold off, to abstain, 366. 
Aphormee, a means, occasion, 348. 
Apollumi, to destroy, 265, 289. 
Aproskopos, not a cause of stumbling, 337. 
Architriklinos, the chief guest, president, 

302. 
Artos, bread, a loaf, 295. 
Asked, to work up, to exercise, 317. 
Askos, a skin-bag, a bottle, 265, 289, 293. 
Asotia, dissoluteness, 352. 
Astheneema, weakness, scruple, 317. 
Astheneia, weakness, 372. 
Ballo,X.o place, to put, to cast, 265,289,293. 



APPENDIX B. 



429 



Bared, to be weighty {passive, weighed 

down), 299. 
Baruno, to be heavy or dull, 299. 
Brdma, food, 323, 370. 
Brosis, food, 323 
Cholee, gall, 287. 

Chorea, to give place, to hold, 302. 
Chraomai, to use, 371 {chrb). 
Chreestoteros, better, 294. 
Daimonion, a demon, 267. 
Deipnon, chief meal, supper, 338. 
Diachleuazo, to jeer outright, 312. 
Diakonos, a servant, 302. 
Diakrino, to discriminate, to be in doubt 

of, 326. 
Didachee, teaching, what is taught, 272. 
Dikaioo, to treat as righteous, to show to 

be righteous, 295. 
Dikaids, righteously, 345. 
Dibkb, to follow after, to pursue, 324. 
Dipsab, to thirst, 275. 
Dokimos, approved, accepted, 324. 
Doulagogeb, to lead as a slave is led, 334. 
Douleub, to enslave, 332. 
Douloo, to be enslaved to, devoted to, 

378. 
Duo, two, 302. 

Echo, to have, to hold, 302, 309. 
Eidb, to see, to know, 302. 
Eidos, form, aspect, 366. 
Eilikrineia, sincerity, 328. 
Ekched, to pour out, to spill, 265, 289, 

293- 

Ekneepho, to return to a sober state, to 
awake, 345. 

Ekpeirab, strongly to tempt, 261. 

Elaion, oil, 297. 

Elassbn, inferior, worse, 303. 

Eletctheria, liberty, 348. 

Enthusneesis, device, 315. 

Epieikes, gentleness, forbearance, 355. 

Epiteleb, to complete, to perfect, 347. 

Esthib, to eat, 266, 274, 295, 296, 299, 
298 {phage), 338 {phagein). 

Etiarestos, well pleasing, acceptable, 324. 

Eucharisteb, to give thanks, 276. 

Euchee, a vow, 315, 316. 

Euphrainb, to make glad, 298. 

Euscheemenos, becomingly, 322. 

Exesti, is possible (in a moral sense), 
what it is possible to do with a good 
conscience, 330. 

Exousiazb, to have power over {passive, 
to be subject to), 330. 

Georgos, a worker of the ground, agricul- 
turist, 274, 290. 

Greegoreb, to be wakeful, to watch, 360. 

Hagibsunee, holiness, 347. 

Heemera, day, 276, 312, 360. 

Hekastos, each one, 338. 

Hora, hour, 372. 

Hosakis, as often, 343. 



Hudor, water, 266, 289, 302. 
Hudrios, of water, 302. 
Hudropeied, to be a water drinker, 302. 
Hupodeigma, a pattern, 384. 
Htipogrammos, a writing-copy, example, 

384- 
Hupolambanb, to take up, to imagine, 

312. 
Hupopiazb, to press or strike under, 334. 
Hussbpos, hyssop, 311. 
Hustereb, to fail, to run short, 301. 
Iakbb, Jacob, 309. 
Idios, one's own, 338. 
ICainos, new, superior, 276. 
Kakos, evil, 324, 375, 381. 
Kalamos, a cane, a reed, 288, 291. 
Kaleb, to call, to invite, 301. 
Kalos, beautiful, good, choice, 303, 382. 
Kana, Cana, 301. 
Katakrino, to condemn, 326. 
Katahib, to dissolve, to demolish, 342. 
Katharos, pure, 324. 
Keiomai, to lie {passive, to be placed), 

3". 

Kleptees, a thief, 360. 

Kbmos, revelry, 322, 349. 

Kraipalee, seizure, debauch, 299. 

Kreas, flesh (dead), 324. 

Ktisis, creature, ordinance, 383. 

Ktisma, created thing, 370. 

Kuriakos, of the Lord, 338. 

Lambano, to take, 300. 

Leenos, (wine-) press, 273. 

Lego, to say, to speak, 312. 

Lithinos, of stone, 302. 

Malakee, malady, illness, 263. 

Mestob, to fill, 312. 

Metreetees, a measure, 302. 

Mignumi, to mix, to mingle, 287. 

Mikros, little, 328. 

Molusmos, defilement, 347. 

Monos, alone, only, 266. 

Neos, new, young, 265, 289, 293, 378 

{fleas'). 
Nomos, law, 348. 
Nosos, sickness, disease, 263. 
Nux, night, 360 {nuktos). 
Oikodespotees, master of the house, 273. 
Oligos, little, 371. 
Oiideis, no one, 294. 
Paideud, to train up, to discipline, 378. 
Palaios, old, 265, 289, 293, 294. 
Paradidomi, to deliver, to betray, 343. 
Pas, all, 290, 295, 303, 330, 332, 333, 

347, 348, 366, 375- 
Pateer, father, 276. 
Peegee, a spring, 309. 
Peinab, to hunger, 339. 
Peirasmon, state of trial, temptation, 

264. 
Perititheemi, to place round, 291, 311. 
Phagos, an eater, a glutton, 267. 



430 



APPENDIX B. 



Phero, to bear, to carry, 302 (eenenkan). 
Philarguria, love of money, 375. 
Phragmos, inclosure, fence, 273, 290. 
Phreear, a well, 309. 
Pimplee?ni, to fill, 311 {pleesantes). 
Pino, to drink, 266, 274, 276, 290, 291, 

292, 294, 295, 296, 298, 299, 343. 
Pleeroo, to fill up, 353. 
Pneuma, spirit, 353. 
Poieo, to do, 343. 
Polus, much, 368, 378. 
Poneeros, evil, 264, 366. 
Posis, drink, 357. 
Poteerion, a drinking- vessel, a cup, 266, 

275, 289, 290, 300, 343. 
Polis, drink, 323. 
Potizo, to give to drink, 275. 
Prolambano, to take first, to snatch up, 

338. 
Prosecho, to give to, be addicted to, 368. 
Proskomma, a stumbling, a cause of 

stumbling, 322, 324. 
Psuchros, cold, 266. 
Puknos, frequent, 372. 
Purgos, a tower, 274. 
Rheegnumi, to rend, to burst, 265, 289, 

293- 
Rhiza, a root, 375. 
Sarx, flesh, 346, 348. 



Saton (pi. sata), a measure = "1% Eng- 
lish gallons, 267. 

Skandalizo, to ensnare, to cause to trans- 
gress, 263. 

Skandalon, a snare, a means of trans- 
gression, 273, 322. 

Skeuos, a vessel, 311. 

Smumizo, to mingle with myrrh, 291. 

Soma, body, 334. 

Sophia, wisdom, 295. 

Spongon, 2l sponge, 288, 291, 31 1. 

Stomachon, stomach, 372. 

Suchar, Sychar, 308. 

Sumpkero, to hold together, to be of 
advantage, 330. 

Sumpheron, advantage, benefit. 

Sitnteereo, to watch over, to hold together, 
to preserve, 265, 293. 

Technee, art, 315. 

Technon, child, 295. 

Peered, to watch over, to preserve, 303. 

Teleioo, to fulfill, 311. 

Thelo, to wish, 294. 

Theos, God, 290. 

Tis, a certain one, 339. 

Titheemi, to place, to set, 303. 

Treis, three, 302. 

Tritos, third, 312. 

Trogo, to craunch, to eat, 274. 



APPENDIX C. 



The application of 'Yayin' and • Oinos' to the unfermented juice 

of the grape. 
Those who are eager to array the Scriptures in opposition to the Temperance 
cause, either avowedly or tacitly reason thus: — "The juice of the grape when 
called wine was always fermented, and being fermented, was always intoxicating." 
This can only mean that the Hebrew yayin and the Greek oinos were always used 
to designate the juice of grape in a fermented state ; and that being so, it was of 
necessity possessed of an alcoholic and intoxicating quality. But to sustain these 
assumptions it would be requisite for their authors to offer a body of evidence more 
voluminous than they have ever attempted to collect, and utterly beyond their 
power to adduce. They would need to make it probable (at least) that wherever 
these terms occur, in all ancient literature, a fermented and intoxicating substance 
is denoted ; and no such probability could be established, even were the stupendous 
research demanded for the undertaking to be forthcoming. On the contrary, both 
members of the proposition can be disproved, and a single example in disproof 
would suffice to destroy the theory, which needs for its special purpose a rule 
without an exception. 

1. Taking the second assumption first, it is demonstrable that even if all the 
ancient wines were fermented, they were not all intoxicating. To suppose that a 
fermented article must be intoxicating is an obvious fallacy, in sight of the* familiar 
fact that though nearly all the bread we eat is fermented not a particle is inebriating, 
and that the greatest bread-eater is never known to be in the slightest degree drunk. 
The explanation is simple : the alcohol formed in the dough (by the action of the 
yeast on the sugar of the flour) is expelled in the baking ; and when it is known 
that a large class of ancient wines were boiled and reduced to a jelly state, the 
conclusion in regard to their non-alcoholic state is clear to any but the most 
prejudiced mind. When it is also known that the custom of filtering away the gluten 
of grape-juice was common, in order to break its strength, and that wine was mixed 
with two, three, and even four times its own bulk of water, the result of fermentation 
must have been to provide (as in ginger beer) a liquid practically unlike what is 
conceived of when mention is made of an ' intoxicating drink.' It is, therefore, a 
hasty and entirely erroneous conclusion, that even fermented grape-juice must 
always have been consumed in the form of an alcoholic and inebriating fluid. 

2. But it is no less rash and fallacious to maintain that the Hebrew yayin and 
oinos were employed to distinguish fermented grape-juice from the grape-juice in an 
unfermented state. 

(i) This hypothesis is invested with much antecedent unlikelihood, from the 
absence of any corresponding term, either Hebrew or Greek, for unfermented 
grape-juice. The Hebrew, it is true, has ahsis, and the Greek gleukos ; but ahsis 
is first applied to the juice of pomegranates, and seems to be a poetical expression 
for the juice of fruit newly expressed, and doubtless unfermented, but not distin- 
guished as such by the name bestowed on it. (See Prel. Dis., xxiii; Notes, 154, 
228, 232 ; and Appendix B, 416.) Gleukos is properly an adjective signifying ' sweet,' 



432 APPENDIX C. 



and oinos is always implied, so that gleukos is oinos in a certain condition, — one of 
great sweetness, frequently but not necessarily free from fermentation. (See PreL. 
Dis., xxiii, xxxvi; Notes 116, 312 — 314, 378; and Appendix B.) 

(2) If appeal is made to etymology, the balance of evidence as to yayin strongly 
supports the view that that term was applied to grape-juice, without any reference, 
direct or indirect, to the process of fermentation. As to oinos — its derivation from 
yayin, the most probable of all the conjectures on that head, would disengage it 
in a similar manner from any necessary connection with the fermentative action 
and its results. 

(3) When we inquire into the actual usage of these words we shall see how 
unfounded is the theory that limits the sense of both terms to the fermented juice 
of the grape. 

(a) Yayin. — Though yayin occurs 141 times in the Old Testament, the context, 
in a great majority of cases, does not furnish an indication as to its condition, 
whether fermented or otherwise. The first time the name occurs (Gen. ix. 21) it is 
applied to grape-juice which had fermented; but it is most probable that Noah 
was ignorant of the fact ; and who supposes that whatever appellation he gave the 
expressed juice would have respect to its inebriating quality? In the case 
where Jacob brings wine to Isaac, the nature of the yayin is not hinted at, but the 
Jewish commentator refers to it as wine that had been ' reserved in its grapes ' 
since the Creation — a proof that he did not consider either yayin, or the Chaldee 
equivalent, khamar, limited to a fermented liquid. The same usage recurs in the 
Targum paraphrase of Cant. viii. 2, where the righteous are promised the blessing 
of ' drinking old wine stored up in its grapes ' since the commencement of the 
Creation or present dispensation. Baal Hatturim refers to ' wine in the grapes ' at 
Pentecost; and on Deut. xxii. 14, 'the pure blood of the grape,' the Targumists 
dwell on the quantity of red wine which should be drawn out from one grape- 
cluster. ■ In the prophecy of Jacob, Gen. xlix. 1 1, we have — 

" He shall wash his garments in wine, 
And (shall wash) his clothes in the blood of grapes " ; 

where the genius of Hebrew poetry requires that ' wine ' {yayin) in the first line shall 
be considered to answer in sense to ' blood of grapes ' in the second line. In Deut. 
xxviii. 39, ' thou shalt plant vineyards, and dress (them), but the yayin thou shalt 
not drink, and shalt not gather,' the allusion to 'gathering,' is most probable to 
yayin as wine in the grapes, and hence as used collectively for the grapes ; and in 
Jer. xl. 10, 12, gathering yayin is, beyond all doubt, spoken of the grapes in 
which, as in natural bottles, the yayin is contained. In Isa. xvi. 10, 'the treaders 
shall tread (out) no wine in their presses ' ; and Jer. xlviii. 33, ' I have caused wine 
to fail from the winepresses: none shall tread with shouting,' the only question 
in doubt can be whether the reference is to the grapes holding the wine, or to the 
wine as flowing from the grapes : no one can pretend that the term is applied to 
the fermented juice of the grape. In Psa. civ. 15, the yayin which 'makes glad 
the heart of man ' is classed with products of the earth, to whose natural properties 
the Psalmist alludes as indicating the grace and power of the Creator. The con- 
nection of yayin with milk (Cant. v. I ; Isa. lv. 1) brings before the mind a rural 
image of fresh-pressed juice drunk with fresh-drawn milk; and in Lam. ii. 12, the 
plaint of the children — ' where is corn and wine ? ' — is most naturally construed as 
pointing to a famine of the fruits of the earth, including the fruit of the vine in its 
vintage state. 

(b) Oinos.— As the Greek translations of the Hebrew Bible nearly uniformly 
render yayin by oinos, all the above considerations in favor of yayin as embracing 



APPENDIX C. 433 



unfermented grape-juice apply also to oinos. In Deut. xxxii. 14, also, the Lxx. 
renders ' the pure (foaming) blood of the grape ' by ' and the blood of the grape 
he drank — wine.' The peculiar use of y ay in for the grape, as containing vine- 
juice, is paralleled by the words of Nymphodorus, who speaks of Drimacus as 
'taking wine from the fields.' (See p. 198 of the Notes.) Among other argu- 
ments against identifying oinos with fermented grape-juice (beyond those of its 
derivation from yayin, and the undoubted use of gleukos to signify unfermented 
wine), the following may be stated: — 

(i.) The intimate relation between oinos and words used for describing the vine 
and its appurtenances. The most ancient name for 'vine' was oinee or oina ; and 
long after ampelos had become the common name for vine, oina retained its place in 
poetry. Euripides has both oina (vine) and oinantha (vine-shoot or blossom). To 
this category belong oinopedee (vineyard), oinaron (vine-leaf), oinaris (vine-tendril 
or branch), oinophutos (planted with the vine), oinotrop (vine-prop), and many 
others. That there is a common etymological relation between these words and 
oin-os cannot be doubted; and the fact of that relation is subversive of the theory 
that oinos implies the idea of the ' fermenting ' process. 

(ii.) There are a great variety of passages in which wine is spoken of as produced 
within the grape and the cluster. Pindar describes wine as the ' child of the vine ' 
{ampelou pais). iEschylus (' Agam.', 970) describes Zeus as bringing wine (oinon) 
'from the green grape,' which F. A. Paley (in his admirable edition of that poet) 
notices as an allusion to the divine action in bringing the grape-juice to maturity at 
the vintage. 

Euripides ('Phoenix,' 230) refers to a particular vine which distilled 'daily 
nectar — a fruitful cluster ' ; and the learned editor illustrates this by the tradition 
that a cluster of this vine ripened every day, and supplied the daily libation of wine 
for Bacchus. 

Anacreon (Ode 49) speaks of the oinos as 'offspring of the vine' {gonon 
ampelou), and as ' imprisoned {pepedeemenon) in fruit upon the branches ' ; and he 
sings (Ode 51) of the treaders 'letting loose the wine,' — where the poetical 
imagery refers not, as some one has said, to the grape-juice as only figuratively 
wine, but to literal wine, as first imprisoned, and then gaining its freedom ; — else 
the whole beauty of the figure disappears. 

Nonnos, in his 'Bacchanal Songs,' refers (xii. 42) to the grape-bunch (botrus) 
as the wine-producer (pinotokori) ; and he describes the vineyard as flushing with 
the wine to which it thus gives birth. 

(iii.) The juice of the grape at the time of pressure is distinctly denominated oinos. 

Papias, a Christian bishop who lived at the close of the apostolic age, relates 
an extravagant current prediction of a time when the vine should grow to a won- 
drous size; and each grape should yield, when pressed, twenty-five measures of 
wine — oinon. (See Notes, p. 276.) 

Proclus, the Platonist philosopher, who lived in the fifth century, and annotated 
the 'Works and Days' of Hesiod, has a note on line 611, the purport of which is 
to explain that after the grape-bunches have been exposed ten days to the sun, and 
then kept ten days in the shade, the third process was to tread them and squeeze 
out the wine — kai triton outos epitoun ekthlibontes ton oinon. 

A careful search through classical literature would, no doubt, bring to light 
numerous passages where oinos was applied to the juice of the grape before its 
fermentation was possible ; but the foregoing remarks will be sufficient to indicate 
the fallacy of the contrary assumption. The extract from Proclus it in itself 
perfectly conclusive. 

55 



APPENDIX D. 



Wines, Ancient and Modern. 
That intoxicating wines, both fermented and drugged, were in extensive use in 
ancient times, is what no one disputes. It would be rank folly to do so. On the 
other hand, it is equal folly to affirm, — what multitudes nevertheless constantly do, — 
that zmintoxicating wines were unknown in antiquity, or regarded with little favor 
by the wise and good. To set this matter at rest, we have prepared a series of 
extracts and translations from ancient and modern authors, showing that the class 
of substances known under the name of Wine, in various ages and countries, com- 
prehended, not only fully fermented wines and drugged potions, the 'poison of 
dragons,' but a large variety of drinks from the grape-juice, carefully prepared so 
as to keep fermentation at its minimum, to pure or boiled grape-juice absolutely 
free from all taint of fermentation or alcohol. In our Preliminary Dissertation and 
Appendix C, the mere word question is settled by induction — here we have only to 
do with things — things practically and theoretically quite contrasted with port, 
sherry, and tent. To deal alike with wines so varied and different, would be a case 
of unparalleled fanaticism. 

I. 

Original Authorities on Ancient Wines. 

In the absence of precise knowledge of the nature of the wines and other 'liquor 
of grapes,' which the ancient Jews in Palestine were in the habit of using, an 
approximation has been sought among those in ordinary consumption by the 
Greeks and Romans. Since garbled citations have often been furnished from 
classic authors, no apology need be offered for more extended quotations and care- 
ful translations, with comments interspersed for the illustration of a subject which, 
though familiar enough to the farmer and peasant in the southern lands of the vine, 
must unavoidably be obscure even to the educated classes of Britain and America. 

Pliny devoted the whole of the 14th Book of his Historia Naturalis (A. D. 60) 
to the consideration of potable liquors, and his concluding observations convey a 
clear conception as to their universal use in vine countries. (We cite from Jahn's 
Leipsic edition.) 

Duo sunt liquores humanis corporibus gratissimi, intus vini, /oris olei, arboritm 
e genere ambo prcecipui, sed olei necessarius. Nee segniter in eo vita elaboravit. 
Quanto tamen in potu ingeniosior adparebit, ad bibendum generibus centum octo- 
ginta quinque, si species vero cestimentur, pcene duplici mimero excogitatis, tantoque 
paucioribus olei — "There are two liquors most grateful to the human body, wine 
for internal use, oil for outward application, both of them principally from some 
kind of tree,' but oil a necessity. The life of man has been employed, and not 
sluggishly, in their invention. Yet how much greater is the amount of ingenuity 



APPENDIX D. 435 



bestowed on the drink, will be apparent from there having been 185 kinds invented 
for drinking, which, if species were counted in the number, would be nearly- 
doubled, but of oils there be fewer by far." 

The distinction as to genus and species will appear from an extract (xiv. 6. 2) 
concerning fashionable wines : — Secunda nobilitas Falerno agro erat, et eo tnaxume 
Faustiniano — "The second rank belonged to the Falernian district, and in that 
most of all to the Faustian." The Faustian was a subordinate district in the 
Falernian, and after describing minutely (by reference to a bridge, the left hand, a 
village, and distances by miles) the locality of each, he continues : — Nee ulli nunc 
•vino major atcctoritas ; solo vinorum flamma accenditur — "No district has greater 
note in the matter of wine; by it alone of all wines, a blaze is lighted up." Tria 
ejus genera, austerum, dulce, tenue. Quidam ita distingunt : su??zmis collibus cau- 
cinum gigni, mediis Faustinianum, imis Falernum — "There are three kinds, the 
rough, the sweet, and the thin* Some persons distinguish them thus : — the Cau- 
cinum is produced on the highest range of hills, the Faustinium on the middle, 
and the [true] Falernian on the lowest." 

Thus when the Patrician host promised his guests 'Falernian,' they might, 
according to his reputation for an excellent cellar or otherwise, expect the best or 
the worst of the three species. 

Some wines, it seems, had a prestige on medicinal grounds, similar to that in 
the present day for old Port, London stout, or bitter beer, founded on some 
'opinion of the faculty,' in the acquired taste of the individual, or its apparent 
want of positive disagreement with his system. Pliny, after noticing with disgust 
the discordant recommendations of the faculty as to wine for persons in health, pur-, 
sues the subject with reference to cases in which health was impaired (xxiii. 2. 24). 

Nunc circa cegritudines sermo de vinis erit. Saluberrimu?n liberaliter 
genitis Campania quodcunque tenuis simum : volgo vero quod quemque 
maxume juverit validwn. Utilissimum omnibus sacco VIRIBUS fractis. 
Meminerimus sucum esse qui fervendo viris musto sibi fecetit. " My dis- 
course upon wines shall now be with reference to conditions of disease. For 
the gentry the very thinnest Campanian will be the most wholesome; but to 
the common people any full-bodied wine that would most support the person. The 
most useful for everybody is that which has its strength broken by the filter. 
We must bear in mind that there is a juice \sucus~\ which, by fermenting, would make 
to itself viris out of the must." The sucus represents the gluten, the detention 
whereof in the sackcloth while straining the 'must,' prevents it from fermenting 
and acquiring the viris so dreaded, but the filter could never stop it after it had 
once generated. 

This related to ordinary wines, which must not be confounded with such as were 
purposely compounded with medicinal intent. The Romans being ignorant of 
distilled liquors, and in the habit of using wines in general of small alcoholic power, 
had no need of the powerful tinctures prescribed in the present day, but made thin 
common wines, and even more frequently grape syrups, the vehicle for the admin- 
istration of drugs. 

Of wormwood and hyssop, Pliny says (xiv. 16. 5) : — Ex ceteris herbis, jit 
absinthites in xl. sextariis musti absinthi Pontici libra decocta ad tertias partis, vel 
scopis absinthi in vinum additis . . . Similiter hyssopites e Cilicio hyssopo unciis 
tribus in duos congios musti cojectis aut tunsis in vinum. "From other herbs, 



* Athenseus (i. 48) says, "Galen is represented as saying that the Falernian is fit to drink from its 
fifteenth to twentieth year, but after that, is apt to give headaches, and disturbs the nervous system." 



436 APPENDIX D. 



wormwood-wine is made by boiling down to one-third a pound of Pontic worm- 
wood in forty sextarii of must (a sextarius was nearly a pint and half), or two scopi 
(say handfuls) of wormwood added to wine. In like manner hyssop wine, by 
throwing three ounces of Cilician hyssop into two congii of must (a congius was 
hardly a gallon), or crushing it into wine." Thus, whether must or fermented 
wine were used, one of them formed the basis of the compound, and its quantity 
was to be in large proportion to that of the drug. 

Of myrtle (xiv. 16) : — Myrtiten Cato quern admodum fieri docuerit mox paulo 
indicabimus, Grceci et alio modo. Ramis teneris cum suis foliis in albo musto 
decoctis, tunsis, libram in tribus musti congiis deferve faciunt, donee duo supersint. — 
"A little further on we shall show how Cato would have instructed for the making 
of myrtle-wine. But the Greeks had another method. They beat the tender twigs 
with their leaves, put them into white must that had been boiled down, a pound to 
three gallons of must ; they caused it to be boiled down until two remained." Of 
such wine Columella says, lib. xii. c. 38: — Vinum myttiten ad tormina, et ad alvi 
proluviem, et ad imbeclllum stomachum sic facito — "After this manner make myrtle- 
wine, for the gripes, and for a purgative of the bowels, and for weakness of the 
stomach." * 

Of hellebore all that Pliny says is (xiv. 16. 5) : — Sic et helleboriten fieri ex 
veratro nigro Cato docet. — "In this way also Cato instructs how hellebore wine is 
to be made from the black veratrum." On turning to Cato's own work (cxv) his 
recipe is found to run thus : — In vinum mustum veratri atri manipulum conjicito 
in amphoram. Ubi satis efferverit de vino manipulum ejicito ; id vinum servato ad 
alvum movendam — " Throw a manipulum [a handful] of black hellebore into new 
wine in an amphora [full]. When it shall have fermented sufficiently, throw the 
manipulus out of the wine; keep that wine for moving the belly [as an aperient]." 
The chapter of Pliny which contains these three recipes, relates to artificial wines, 
and it is apparent that each composition was intended for a medicine rather than a 
beverage. The last of the three must have been about as nauseous as a modern 
black draught, t Wormwood might have been used in very small doses by the 
glutton, as a provocative to eating. 

The existence of dry wines conceded, the taste for sweet wine, and the ingenuity 
employed in making it, may be best explained by the recipe left for it, premising, 
however, that the article does not correspond with that which the English now 
term 'a sweet wine.' The original is in Columella, De Re Rustica, (xii. c. 27) — 
Vinum dulce sic facere oportet. Uvas legito, in sole per triduum expandito, quarto 
die meridiano tempore calidas uvas proculcato, mustum lixivum, hoc est, antequam 
prcelo pressum sit, quod in lacum musti fluxerit, tollito, cum deferbuerit in sextarios 
quinquaginta iridem bene pinsitam nee plus uncice ponder e addito, vinum afecibus 
eliquatum diffundito. Hoc vinum erit suave, firmum, corpori salubre — " Gather 
the grapes in the bunches — spread them out in the sunshine for three days ; on the 
fourth day, at the noontide hour, proculcato, tread out the grapes, calidas, while 
they are hot [by several hours' exposure to the sun's rays] ; take the mustum 
lixivium, that is, such as should flow into the lake of must before it [the mass of 

* Mnesitheus, cited by Athenaeus, (ii. 2) says of wine : — " A wholesome physic 'tis when mixed 
with potions ; heals wounds as well as plasters or cold lotions." Why do not drinkers think of this 
sort of wine when citing the case of Timothy ? 
t Alcaeus, quoted by Athenaeus (ii. 2), says : — 

" Wine sometimes than honey sweeter, 
Sometimes more than nettles bitter." 
Alexis, quoted by the same authority (i. 57), says :— " Foreign wine was rare, and that from Corinth 
'nful drinking. 



APPENDIX D. 437 



grapes] should be pressed by the beam; cum deferbuerit, when it shall have cooled 
down [the grapes having been trodden while hot], add to every fifty sextarii [of 
must] not exceeding an ounce of iris well pounded, rack off the wine by pouring it 
from the dregs [this being a more careful operation than straining]. This wine 
will be sweet [or smooth], sound-bodied, and wholesome to the body." 

Columella knew experimentally what he was teaching, and his plan is theoretic- 
ally and practically correct, in accordance with modern science. He first directs 
to gather the grapes in the clusters, a direction which might appear superfluous 
were it not known from other recipes that the ancients had also a method of gently 
twisting the stalks, and stripping off the leaves, so as to allow the grapes to wilter 
on the vine. He here bids you spread out the grapes to the heat of the sun long 
enough to thicken the juice to the degree known to prevent fermentation ; though 
this was not the only plan, for sometimes the clusters were hung on poles and 
trellis. He next instructs to take the grapes up at noon, after they had been 
exposed for six or seven hours to a southern sun, and, while hot, have them 
lightly trodden, the naked feet being less likely than a huge wooden beam to break 
the little cells containing the gluten, i. e. the fermentable matter which, by action 
of the oxygen of the air, would proceed to ferment. It also more easily admitted 
of an adjusted pressure, by boys and girls instead of men. The heated state of the 
grapes was purposely chosen for treading, because the juice would flow more 
readily under gentle pressure than if the grapes were allowed to cool. This was 
the second precaution against fermentation. Then as much as fifty sextarii (nine 
gallons) of the must in the state of mtistum lixivium, such as came flowing into the 
lake before applying the press, are to be taken, and some orris root to be put to it, 
finely pounded and not merely crushed, the quantity being carefully specified. 
For some reason not stated, but doubtless understood at the time, the juice was 
allowed to cool before the iris was mixed with it. Lastly, it was to be racked off, 
the mode of doing it being by pouring the wine off the top of the vessel, whereby 
it would come away much clearer than by straining, which tends to render even a 
clear wine muddy. 

The Romans had, likewise, a very luscious wine, of a similar nature, distin- 
guished by the name of passum, because made from uv<z passce, grapes partially 
dried. Pliny's description of the mode of making it, is intended rather for the 
general reader than the vine-grower (xiv. 9) : — Passum a Cretica Cilicium pro- 
batur, et Africum et in Italia finitimisque provinciis. Fieri cerium est ex uva quam 
GrcBci psithiam vocant, nos apianam, item scripulam. Diutius in vite sole adustis 
autferventi oleo. Quidam ex quacumque dulci, dum prcecocta, alba, faciunt sic- 
cantes sole, donee, paulo amplius dimidium pondus supersit, tunsasque leniter expri- 
munt — "After the Cretan passum, the Cilician is the most approved, then the 
African, and [what is made] in Italy and the neighboring provinces. It is to be 
made with the greatest certainty from the grape which the Greeks call Psithiam, 
we Apiana, also from the scirpula [grape], the cluster being [either] partially dried 
in the sunshine for a longer time upon the vine [by being suffered to hang with the 
branch slightly twisted so as to cause it to wither], or else [by being immersed for 
a time] in boiling oil. Some make it out of any luscious grape, provided it 
be of the white and early ripe sort, drying the clusters in the sunshine 
until little more than half [the original] weight remains, and press out [the 
juice] by gently crushing [the clusters]." And Columella (xii. 39) gives at full 
length the old recipe of Mago, for making passum optimum [the best passum], 
whereby he himself had made it, and which commences — Uvam prcecoquem bene 
maturam legere, acina arida, aut vitiosa rejicere — " Gather the early species of 



438 APPENDIX D. 



grape in the cluster when thoroughly ripe, throw aside those grapes that are either 
dry or rotten; " and goes on— -f ureas, vel palos, qui cannas susiineant, inter qua- 
ternos pedes figere, et perticis jugare — "Then fix at intervals of four feet apart 
forked sticks or posts, in order to support the reeds, and yoke them together with 
cross poles." Turn insuper cannas ponere, et in sole pandere uvas etnoctibus tegere 
ne irrorentur — "Then lay the reeds on the top, and spread out the clusters in the 
sunshine, and cover them every night, lest they should become wet with dew." 
Cum deinde exaruerint, acina decerpere, et in dolium, aut in seriam conjicere, eodem 
mustum quam optimum, sic ut grana submersa sint, adjicere — "When by this pro- 
cess they shall have become dry, pluck off the grapes and throw them together into 
a dolium or a seria [vessels holding from sixty to seventy-five gallons] ; throw to 
it so much of the very best must that the grains may be drowned under it." Ubi 
combiberint uvce seque impleverint, sexto die in fiscellam conferre, et prcelo premere, 
passumque tollere — "When the grapes shall have thoroughly imbibed and filled 
themselves [with the musf], on the sixth day [from the gathering] put them 
together into a frail, and squeeze them with a press, and take away the passum." 
Further on is the recipe for passum alluded toby Pliny : — Uvam apianam integram 
legito, acina corrupta purgato, et secernito ; postea in perticis suspendito, perticce ut 
semper in sole sint facito ; ubi satis corrugata erunt, acina demito, et sine scipioni- 
bus in dolim conjicito pedibusque bene calcato — " Gather the Apiana grapes in the 
cluster without injuring them ; pluck off the rotten grains [berries], and set them 
aside; after this, hang up [the clusters] on poles; manage so that the poles may 
be always in the sunshine [a variation from Mago's plan of spreading them out on 
reeds or straw] ; when they have been sufficiently wrinkled throughout, strip off 
the grapes, and throw them together, without the stalks, into a dolium, and tread 
them well with the feet." Ubi tinum tabulatum feceris, vinum vetus conspergito, 
postea alterum supercalcato et item vinum conspergito ; eodem modo tertium calcato 
et infuso vino ita superponito ut supernatet, et sinito dies quinque — "When you 
shall have made one layer, sprinkle it well with old wine ; after that, tread it 
lightly, and a second time sprinkle it thoroughly with wine ; after a third similar 
treading and infusion of wine, heap it up so that [the mass of grapes] may float on 
the top, and leave it for five days." 

The Romans imported wine from other countries, and sometimes even took the 
pains to fabricate imitations. Here is Columella's recipe for an ancient Greek 
wine (xii. 37) : — Vinum simile Grcecofacere. Uvas prccecoqtias quam ?naturissimas 
legito, easque per triduum in sole siccato, quarto die calcato, et mustum quod nihil 
habeat ex tortivo, conjicito in seriam, diligenterque curato, ut cum deferbuerit, feces 
expurgentur : deinde quinto die cum purgaveris mustum, salis cocti et cfibrati duos 
sextarios, vel quod est minimum, adjicito unum sextarium in sextarios musti xlix. 
Quidam etiam defruti sextarium miscent : nonnulli etiam duos adjiciunt si existi- 
mant vina notam parum esse firmam — "To make Wine like the Greek, gather the 
early ripe grapes as thoroughly ripe as may be, and dry them in the sunshine for 
three days ; on the fourth day tread [them], and throw the must — which should 
not have a particle of that produced by the press — all together into a seria, and use 
every diligence and care when it shall have cooled down, that the dregs may be 
cleared off; then, on the fifth day, when you shall have cleared the must, add to it 
two sextarii of baked and sifted salt, or at the very least one sextarius to forty-nine 
sextarii of must. Some mingle a sextarius of defrutum; a few even add two 
[sextarii], if they consider the wine has too little body." 

This was for making a large quantity ; and although the exact measure of the 
seria is not known, it must have held the forty-nine sextarii, or about nine gallons, 



APPENDIX D. 439 



independent of the salt and defrutum. The kind of Greek wine intended to be 
mimicked, though without the specification of a name, was no doubt sufficiently 
understood at the time. It was perhaps classable with passum, for much the same 
directions are given for gathering and drying the clusters ; and although the expo- 
sure to the sunshine was curtailed to three days, that might have been in just pro- 
portion for an early Italian grape, and have had an effect upon a thick-juiced 
one equal to a four or five days' drying on one of thinner juice. The same caution 
is given to have all the must produced by 'treading,' none from the press, which 
was apt to set at liberty the gluten, which, absorbing oxygen, at once commenced 
its work of fermentation. The careful pouring off the must from the settlings at 
the earliest practicable stage, is a further precaution. The addition of the salt 
might be with a view partly to flavor, from the dissolving of a portion of it by the 
thinner aqueous particles of the wine, which, by that very process of saturation, 
were protected from fermentation. If that did not sufficiently answer, — for a wet 
or dry season, or other circumstances, might affect the quality of the vintage, — it 
was a matter of taste to add the defrutum, to give a fuller body. Even if slightly 
fermented, this wine could not be intoxicating. 

The Greeks and Romans also made from grapes another class of articles distin- 
guished amongst the latter by the plural adjective dulcia, emphatically ' the sweets' 
(that being the chief characteristic without regard to the mode of preparation), since 
the word comprised ' boiled-wines * as well as musts. Some kinds may have been 
of a thicker consistency than others, and used for the adulteration of honey, either 
in seasons of scarcity, or to meet the necessities of an increasing population, where 
the art of extracting sugar from the cane had not been discovered. The two most 
notable musts, were the aigleuces (always sweet) and the protropum (before trod- 
den) the Greek names of which denote their origin.* All of them are enumerated 
by Pliny (xiv. 9) : — De dulcium generibus quatuordecem — "Of fourteen kinds of 
dulcia [sweets]." The chapter is worth analysis. The first four are, Psithium 
and Melampsitkium, both of them kinds of passum, having, he says, its flavor, and 
not that of wine; Cybilites, a true Galatian Mulsum ; and Aluntium, from Sicily, 
having the flavor of must ; these four being dependent upon the particular grape 
and soil. The fifth is " Sirceum, by some called Hepsema, but by us (Romans) 
Sapa, of which Defrutum was a variety;" to which he adds, Omnia in adulterium 
mellis excogitata. " All [these latter] were contrived for the adulteration of 
honey." The next were two kinds of passum differently prepared, and two sorts 
of second-rate passum. The tenth, sEigleuces, is thus described: Medium inter 
dulcia vinumque, est quod Graci cegleucos vocant, hoc est semper mustum. Id evenit 
cura, quoniam fervere prohibetur — sic appellant musti in vina transitum — "There 
is an intermediate [article] t between dulcia [sweets] and [what is technically] 
wine, which the Greeks call aigleucos, that is, ' always-wwj/. ' It is the result of 
care, owing to fermentation being prevented, for so they call the passage of musts 
into [common] wines." The means of achieving it was this : Ergo ifiergunt e lacu 
protinus in aqua cados, donee bruma transeat et consuetudo fiat algendi — " To that 
end they sink the casks (immediately [after filling] from the lake) into water [of a 
pond], until the midwinter has passed and a habit of being cold shall have been 
created." The eleventh is a kind of passum from the province of Narbonne, to 
which, he says, some add the Diachylon, the difference only arising from various 
modes of drying the grapes. The thirteenth sort of sweets is Melitites, different 
from mulsum, the composition of which is explained. Lastly, Protropum, of which 



* By others called prodromos, ' first-running.' 

f Not ' quality,' as the Bibliotheca Sacra absurdly translates. 



440 APPENDIX D. 



he says : Ita appellator a qufbusdam mustum sponte defluens, antequam calcenlur 
uvce. Hoc protinus diffusum in lagonis suis defervere passi, postea in sole xl. diebus 
torrent cestatis secutce ipso canis ortu — " By this name some people call the must 
which flows out of its own accord before the grapes are trodden. This immediately 
racked off into flagons [kept] for it, is allowed to cool down ; afterward they roast 
it in the sunshine for forty days, from the rising of the dog-star [in July] in the 
ensuing summer." 

The old Roman law of the twelve tables prohibited intoxicating wine to women, 
who, by inference, were permitted any other kind. Pliny's book (xiv. 13) on the 
use of wine among the ancients, commences : Non licebat idfeminis Romce bibere — 
" It was not lawful to women at Rome to drink that " — he means intoxicating wine, 
and relates some instances of the law being enforced, the husband taking upon 
himself the office of both judge and executioner. He says (15) : — Lautissima apud 
priscos vina errant, murrce odore condita, ut adparet in Plauti fabula quce Persa 
inscribitur quamquam in ea et calamum addijubet. Ideo quidam aromatite delectatos 
maxume credunt. " The ancients had sumptuous wines seasoned with the scent 
of myrrh, as appears from the play of Plautus, entitled Persa ; notwithstanding he 
orders calamus to be added. For this reason some persons think that they [the 
ancients] were very much delighted with aromatics." Pliny further says : " Kins- 
folk kissed the women when they met them, to find whether their breath smelled 
of Temetum. Hoc turn nomen vina erat, unde et temulentia appellata." 

In the same chapter, he quotes the verses of F. Dossennus — 

" Mittebam vinum pulchrum, Murrinam " — 
I sent fair wine, yclept Myrrhine. 

From the comedy of Acharistione, also — 

" Panem et Polentam, vinum Murrinam." 

Quibus adparet non inter VINA modo murrinam, sed inter DULCIA quoque nom- 
inatum. " From which, it is evident, Myrrhina was classed not only among 
wines, but among dulcia also." 

Henderson, in his 'History of Wines,' commenting on the boiled wine of the 
Roman women referred to by Virgil, truly says — "The use of this inspissated 
juice became general."* But he errs when he infers, that, because unfermented 
wine was distinguished from fermented, it was " never called wine, nor used as 
wine" (p. 44). We have given many illustrations to the contrary. Pliny, 
who attempts this technical distinction, cannot adhere to it ; and he has testified 
that an article may come under both classes. Moreover, Pliny is not the Atlas 
of Criticism and the infallible Arbiter of Language. Dr W. H. Rule, in his 
* Brief Inquiry,' confesses that unfermented grape-juice "was the prdtropos or 
prodromos oinos, of the Greeks " (p. 7). Dr Rule contends, rightly enough, 

* The reference is to Virgil's Georgics, i. 293-295, which describes the occupation of a Farmer's 
wife thus : — 

Interea. longum cantu soluta laborem, 
Arguto conjux percurret pectine telas ; 
Aut dulcis ?nusti vulcano decoquit humorem, 
Et foliis undam tepidi despumat aheni. 
The Rev. E. Cobbold thus versifies the passage : — 
" The industrious dame anon 
Sings to the whizzing wheel she urges on. 
Boils the sweet must, slow simmering by her side, 
And skims with leaves the cauldron's bubbling tide." 
The original, however, is not fully expressed for (1) pecten, refers to the slay of the weaver ; (2) 
aheni has a peculiar propriety as referring to the brass cauldron, which is the metal best adapted for 
the purpose of avoiding a burnt flavor; (3) tepidis better consorts with simmering tfcan boiling; (4) 
decoquit expresses more than boiling — namely, inspissating, 'boiling down' The la* two lines may 
be thus rendered: — " And is boiling-down over the fire the luscious liquor must, and taking off with 
leaves the wavy spume of the tepid brazen cauldron." 



APPENDIX D. 441 



that both mustum in Latin and gleukos in Greek, included an intoxicating liquor 
in its applications; and the fact is undeniable that fermentation alone con- 
verts grape-juice into an intoxicating drink. He allows too, that tiros k (trans- 
lated new- wine) "is also spoken of as in the unfermented state." Of the word 
ahsis, too, translated oinos neos, he concedes that "it means the simple pure juice 
of the grape ; " that the equivalent Greek word is gleukos, sweet-must. The most 
ancient (Syriac) version does not translate the word of 'wine,' but by must. The 
Ethiopic has ' drink fresh-made, made from the juice of ripe-fruits.' (Ludolf. Lex. 
&th.) The Chaldee Targum too (Esther i. 7) supposes that Ahasuerus and his 
lords were drunken with khamar-ahsis, fresh grape juice; a luxury quite in 
place on the table of the King of Babylon. Hence two facts appear (1) that to ' dis- 
tinguish ' one wine from another, does not exclude the common property by which 
they are entitled to a common name ; and (2) that even specific names were much 
more vague and general than is often supposed. When Dr Rule asserts that " grape- 
juice is not wine, any more than chaff is bread," he tries to overrule the plainest 
facts in language, and he confounds a contrast with a comparison. Chaff is the 
husk of corn, not the material of bread; but ' grape-juice' is the very substance of 
wine, — as Thomas Aquinas has it, of 'the specific nature of wine.' 



II. 

The Produce of the Vineyard in the East. 

By Rev. Henry Homes, American Missionary at Constantinople.* 
" In a country where wine, as in America, is known as a great promoter of the 
crime of drunkenness, and where the vintage is supposed to be gathered chiefly for 
the purpose of making wine, it is difficult for the mind to do justice to the common 
language of scripture which extols the vine and its products as one of the staffs of 
life. Along with corn and oil \_yitzhar~\, wine \tirosh~\ is almost always combined 
as the third representative of the three chief blessings of the year.'''' (Deut. vii. 13; 
'fruit of the land ' ; Neh. x. 39. ) 

Wine is supposed to be the chief thing obtained from the vine, and there is no 
substance now called ' wine ' t by any one that is not intoxicating ; therefore the 
mind asks that the propriety and consistency should be shown, of making such a 
natural source of evil an emblem of the staff of life along with corn and oil. The 
source of embarrassment seems to arise from the supposition that the chief produce 
of the vineyard is, and was, that which we at this day universally call 'wine,' and 
that the vineyard was cultivated chiefly for its yielding such wine. 

Now, as a resident in the East, we believe sufficient facts can be adduced to ren- 
der it extremely probable that this supposition is erroneous, and that the fabrication 
of an intoxicating liquor was never the chief object fox which the grape was cultivated 
among the Jews. Joined with bread, fruits, and the olive tree, the three might 
well, under the comprehensive words of corn (dagan), wine (tirosh), and oil 
[orchard-fruit'], be representatives of the productions most essential to them, at 
the same time most abundantly provided for the support of life. 

* Abridged from an article in the Bibliotheca Sacra, of May, 1848. We retain the precise words 
of the author ; any of our own are inclosed in brackets [ ]. All the notes are editorial. It is a 
significant fact that while Dr Laurie cites garbled extracts from Eli Smith, who confesses to no first 
rate knowledge, he cautiously avoids the adverse testimony of Messieurs Homes and Robson, who 
made special observations on this subject 

t That is, kumr. Of course not, because this word has been in modern times appropriated to 
intoxicating wine exclusively. A statement, therefore, of this fact, urged as an argument, is a puerile 
quibble. 

56 



44 2 APPENDIX D. 



In Asia Minor and Syria, the largest part of the produce of the vine is used for 
other purposes than making intoxicating liquor — whether the vineyards are owned 
by Moslems, or by the Greek, Armenian, and other Christians. Eli Smith writes 
in reference to Syria: — "Wine is not the most important, but the least so, of all the 
objects for which the vine is cultivated." — (Bib. Sacra, Nov. 1846.) The amount 
made increases near commercial cities. Still, in the vine-growing districts of 
Turkey, the grape stands as prominent among the productions of the country, as a 
source of comfort and prosperity, as the Bible makes it to have been among the 
productions of Judea. 

Our practical moralists, in treating on the use of wine, have had no complete 
information on the existing varieties of 'liquor of grapes.' 

1. The first produce of the vineyard is the Green Grape (Num. vi. 4). It is 
used for its verjuice, to give a tart taste to all articles of food that need it, and for 
making refreshing drinks. The manner of using it is various, either by putting 
the fresh green grapes into the food, or by drying the same in the sun and putting 
them up in bags like raisins, or by pressing out the juice, partially evaporating it 
in the sun, and carefully preserving it in bottles; or, lastly, after having thoroughly 
dried the green grape, it is ground to powder in a mill, and the powder bottled. 
These various preparations give thus a fresh tart vegetable juice for all seasons 
of the year, for cooking meat and vegetables for the table ; and in regions where 
they are never accustomed to see a lemon, they supply the place of lemonade. 
A drink made from the juice of the green grape is most reviving to the weary 
traveler. 

2. The Fresh Ripe Grape in the regions where it is cultivated may be had 
from three to five months in succession (Lev. xxvi. 5), owing to the difference of 
vines, soil, and climate of a particular district. During these months, and indeed 
for many following months, combined with bread it is the main reliance of the 
people for food to eat, for theirs is a ' land of bread and vineyards ' (2 Kings, xviii. 
32). Grapes are not sold in the interior towns at two or three shillings a pound, 
but at the astonishingly low price of from one quarter of a cent to one cent [^d.] 
a pound; and even in Constantinople, with all the causes of dearness, the common 
sorts of grapes can be had for two or three cents a pound. They are so innocuous 
that, in general, one may eat of them with greater freedom than any other kind of 
fruit, even to satiety. It is not to be wondered at that so luscious a fruit, which 
can be obtained at a cheaper rate than potatoes by the poor in Ireland, should form 
in some districts, with oil and bread, the chief nourishment of the people; and that 
the vine should be extensively cultivated for the sake of its solid fruit merely. 

3. Fresh grapes are hung up in dry places in the shade and preserved on 
the cluster, with a little wilting, to eat in the winter; so that the time of fresh 
grapes is protracted for at least two months longer. Mr Schneider, of Broosa, 
remarks that this kind of grapes is sold there as late as February and March ; the 
price is nearly as low as freshly gathered grapes.* 

4. Raisins. In the villages the grapes are hung in clusters on the side of the 
houses, or strewed on blankets on the tops of the houses to dry, and thus they 
prolong the fruits of the vintage for the months when the hung grapes are gone. 
Of their use for all kinds of cakes in cookery, as also for an accompaniment to 
bread, we need not speak, though it should be kept in mind to aid our estimate of 
the value of the whole gathering from the vine, when used in the form of solid-fruit. 



•Hence the inconsequence of the objection that at the Passover no grapes were to be had for 

Mtist-wine. 



APPENDIX D. 443 



5. Preserves made with fresh grape-juice.* One of the very common uses of 
the grape is, to boil the freshly expressed must before it is twenty-four hours old, 
after having removed the acidity and checked the tendency to ferment by throwing 
in calcareous earth, and then to boil with it various kinds of fruits and vegetables 
for sauces and preserves for the whole year. The most usual fruits employed are 
apples, quinces, plums, and peaches ; and of vegetables, green tomatoes, egg plants, 
pumpkins, squashes, and watermelon rinds. Mr Schneider says, " an enormous 
quantity of Retchel (the name in Turkish for this kind of preserves) is made in 
Broosa." 

6. Jellies and confectionery from grape-juice. Other common but singular 
modes of using grape-juice consist in throwing into the juice various preparations, 
as of the ground or broken grains of millet, wheat, barley, rice, or almonds and 
nuts, and especially the starch of wheat. (1) Starch or flour is thrown into the 
boiling juice, and when sufficiently boiled, the syrup is poured out upon cloths to 
dry in the sun. Broken pistachios, almonds, or walnuts, are strewed upon the 
sheet while the material is yet soft, which is then doubled, dried, and ready for 
use. (2) Wheat, and similar grains, soaked in water, are pounded to a pulp or 
mash, and left sufficient time to ferment. When this is boiled with the grape- 
juice, the mess in the cauldron is made into cakes, which, when dried, have a 
sour-sweet taste. (3) Pistachios, almonds, filberts, and the like, having been 
strung on strings, are dipt in the boiling mixture of starch and juice, and hung up 
to dry, covered with the soft sweet paste of the cauldron. There are many other 
similar manufactures, known each by its peculiar name, which are brought to the 
large cities for sale. The emigrants from the country to the city, speak with glow- 
ing animation and yearnings for home, when they allude to these luxuries of their 
native regions. 

7. Pickled grapes. Clusters of good ripe grapes are carefully placed in wooden 
or earthen vessels, so as to two-thirds fill them. Fresh must, boiled down to one- 
half is then poured in, so as to fill the vessels, which are then carefully closed, 
and left to stand from fifteen to twenty days. When ready for use, the grapes and 
juice are offered together, to be eaten or drunk. 

8. Grape Syrup or Molasses * is made of must that has not been pressed [out] 
more than twenty-four hours. Upon the grapes before pressing, or upon the 
expressed juice, calcareous earth is often thrown, to neutralize the acid and purify 
the juice. The juice is boiled from five to seven hours, and reduced to one-fifth or 
one-fourth of the original quantity. The syrup differs in consistency in different 
countries, according to the amount of time employed in boiling, being boiled in 
Syria so hard that it does not easily run, while in Turkey it is more liquid than 
sugar cane molasses. It is called in Turkish pekmez, in Arabic dibs, in Persian 
and Armenian rob [probably syrob abbreviated], in Greek hepsema, and some say, 
in Hebrew debash. (So Gesenius.) It is never regarded as a boiled wine or vin 
cuit, but as a sweetening-syrup, although in the Persian the word pekmez appears 
still to signify wine, t (See Lexicon of Meninski. ) It may sour, but never becomes 
wine [in the modern sense]. In cooking various kinds of vegetables with meat 
for the table, making all kinds of cakes, etc., it is in most frequent and constant 
use with families of every rank. By some method, a process I have not seen, 
fresh grape molasses may be made a solid substance like cake or pudding, without 

*The Hebrew shemarim, 'preserves,' may correspond to this (Is. xxv. 6), or sobhe, 'boiled 
wine ' (Is. i. 22). 

t Syrup or Sherap, is still one of the Eastern names for Wine, like Pekmez. So formerly. Herbert, 
A. D. 1638, in his Persian vocabulary, has 'sherap, wine.' And Olearius (1637) says — "They (the 
Ambassadors; received a bottle of scherab, or Persian Wine " (p. 175). 



444 APPENDIX D. 



admixture of any thing else. Beaten and stirred up with mustard-seed for several 
days, it becomes a paste of whitish color, which, mixed with water, forms a cool- 
ing drink like our ginger, molasses, and water. 

9. Simple Boiled Must, or Nardenk. Simple grape juice, without the 
addition of any earth to neutralize the acidity, is boiled from four to five hours, so 
as to reduce it to one fourth of the quantity put in. The grapes usually chosen 
are the species naturally sour, or such as will not ripen. After the boiling, for 
preserving it cool and that it may be less liable to ferment, it is put into earthen 
instead of wooden vessels, closely tied over with skin to exclude the air. Its color 
is dark, its taste an agreeable sour-sweet ; and it is turbid, vegetable gluten being 
suspended in it, even when it has been standing for a long time. It ordinarily has 
not a particle of intoxicating quality, being used freely by both Mohamedans and 
Christians. Some which I have had on hand for two years has undergone no 
change ; still, when not sufficiently boiled, if exposed to the air and heat, it under- 
goes a degree of fermentation, and becomes exhilarating and perhaps intoxicating. 
Nardenk is used as a syrup for a beverage, one part of the syrup to from six to 
fifteen parts of water. In the Bebek seminary it has been often used by the boys 
to eat with their bread, as in America we use molasses. It is sold by all the 
grocers of Constantinople at the same price, or cheaper, than wine. It is not all 
made from the grape, but some of it from apples, and some of it from pomegranate, 
whence it originally had its name. As there has been great search for an unfer- 
mented wine — a wine that would not intoxicate — as soon as I came upon the trace, 
two years since, of such an article as Nardenk, I most perseveringly followed it up, 
till I should find out what it was. For although, in the present use of 'language, an 
unfermented wine is an impossibility, yet here is a cooling grape-liquor not intoxi- 
cating ; and which, in the manner of making and preserving it, seems to correspond 
with the recipes and descriptions of certain drinks included by some of the ancients 
under the appellation 'Wine.' 

10. Grape Sugar or Boulama. This article is derived from the boiling of 
grape-juice to make grape molasses. The scum is ladled off into other boilers ; 
again slightly boiled, cleansed with eggs and poured into barrels for use. It is 
used very extensively in all the villages south of the Sea of Marmora as an article 
of food in its simple state, very much as we use pure honey. It is almost the only 
sweetening used by a numerous class of confectioners. There are probably hun- 
dreds of shops occupied by the manufacturers of confectionery in Constantinople 
from this one article. This sugar is boiled with pounded sesame, or broken wal- 
nuts, or certain roots, or starch, and made into solid masses of confectionery or 
candy. Natives and strangers are very fond of eating it with bread at breakfasts 
and collations, but few strangers are aware of the fact that it is made of this univer- 
sal grape-juice. The Turks are most passionately fond of all confectioneries. 

11. All the vinegar of these Eastern lands is made from this same bountiful 
grape, by pouring water on the juice and leaving it to ferment. Vinegar from sour 
wine would afford but a small portion of the amount needed in commerce. The 
Mohamedans have no objection to using vinegar, though it has fermented. 

12. Raisin drink. Raisins are boiled for two or three hours to make a 
refreshing drink called 'sweet water' {khoshab).* It has no intoxicating quality, 
for the proportion of water is large, and it is drunk only when freshly made. 

13. Raisin wine. This wine is always of domestic manufacture. Four parts 
of warm water by weight to one of raisins are left to soak two days. Then the 

* Literally, khash-ob is boiled- water,' and shir-ob ' sweet-water.' 



APPENDIX D. 445 



raisins are taken out, bruised and again put in till the fermentation has been 
sufficient. The result is a mild liquor of exhilarating qualities. It is called 
in Arabic Nebidh, in distinction from Khamr, the name for ordinary fermented 
wine.* 

14. Wine. All that is now called wine in the East is intoxicating. The boiling 
of must, for the purpose of securing a wine that will keep better, should not be 
confounded with the boiling of the same must, for the purpose of making sugar and 
molasses. In the former case it is boiled perhaps half an hour, and not reduced 
one-twentieth in bulk. By drying the grapes in the sun, or by boiling the must, the 
wine is preserved sweeter than it would otherwise be ; such wines are still intoxi- 
cating. The boiled wines of Mount Lebanon are stronger than the majority of the 
wines of France. The Greeks, in their modern language, call wine krasion or 
* mixed,' instead of the more classical term oinos [wine]. Common resin is put in 
so as to make their common wines as nauseating to a stranger as a bitter dose of 
medicine. 

15. Brandy is distilled, either directly from [fermented] must of good or rotten 
grapes, from the mass of pulp and skins remaining after the juice has been pressed 
out, from the lees of wine, or from wine. It is called raki, or arrack, in the lan- 
guages of the country. Each family in the interior distills his own raki, as they 
make their wine, in their houses. 

1 6. The Leaves and Stocks of the vine. The stock and roots are used 
for fuel. Ezek. xv. 4. The cuttings of the vine and of the leaves are used for 
manure to the vineyard, and the leaves for fodder. The leaves are also used for a 
vegetable, chopped meat and rice being rolled up together in single leaves, and 
boiled for the table. 

In what we have said, we have purposely avoided Biblical criticism and contro- 
versy, wishing simply, by a contribution of facts from an Observer in the East, 
to aid those in discussion of controverted points, who have more time and ability. 
Still we would suggest whether this array of facts on the utility of the grape-vine, 
will not sustain the idea that the greater part of the praises bestowed upon ' wine ' 
as it is translated in our version, are bestowed upon the [fruit, or the] grape-juice 
as freshly expressed, without bringing into view the specific forms in which it may 
afterward be manufactured. The idea that tiros k is used in this general sense, and 
not in a specific one, easily presents itself, seeing that in nearly all the thirty-eight 
cases where the word occurs, it is in connection with corn and [yitzhar, 'orchard- 
fruit'] first-fruits or offerings; and the idea becomes more confirmed when we 
see how many, and important, are the general uses of the grape. 



III. 

An article in the Bibliotheca Sacra, for January, 1869, by Dr Laurie, lays great 
stress on the statements of some modern missionaries, that there is no UNin- 
toxicating substance NOW CALLED ' wine ' in the East. The argument is of no 
value. (1) Because the various substances anciently called wine, are still plentiful 

* Nebidh, as shown by Mr E. W. Lane, the great Arabic scholar and traveler, was originally the 
name of an ««fermented wine. The Arabic word khumr, simply signifies 'turbid' or 'foaming,' 
which applies to the must in the wine-vat, both in its fresh and fermenting state. Mr Lane says : — 
" Nebeedh, a name now given to prohibited kinds of wine. Nebeedh prepared from raisins, is com- 
monly sold in Arab towns under the name of Zebeeb. The prophet himself was in the habit of drink- 
ing wine of this kind. Other beverages to which the name has been applied are, like Zebeeb, no 
longer called by that name, while under the same appellation have been classed the different kinds 
of beer called boozeh." [These words seem corruptions of the Hebrew aneb and sabha.} 



446 APPENDIX D. 



in Syria, and, as we have seen, some are still called wine. (2) Because names 
and language are undergoing perpetual modifications, and even transformations 
and inversions. For instance, sherap is now 'wine' in the East, but syrup 
in the West, and by the same trickery of words, can be proved to have no 
existence in the Orient. Nevertheless, there it is, with its new name. In 
India, toddi means palm-tree-juice, but in Scotland it has become a word for hot 
whisky -and-water. Homes records that krasion, which means ' mixed ' merely, 
has supplanted the old scripture word oinos, 'wine.' (4) Because, instead of the 
primitive language, we have only the testimony, concerning words, of the mixed 
populations of the Syrian cities, which in other cases has led to erroneous conclu- 
sions, and must in this instance. The parties appealed to are often no more judges 
of the matter submitted to them, than a Londoner would be of old Saxon phrases 
to be found in the Yorkshire or Cumberland dialects. As Dr Beard says — "It is 
among the native Aramsean population that the old traditions, knowledge, and 
names are to be learnt " — not in towns where the language and habits are cor- 
rupted with a foreign population. (5) Because the objection equally applies to our 
own word 'wine,' where it demonstratively terminates in a falsity. Ten years 
back only a few philologists knew that wine, 100, 200, 300 and 1800 years ago, 
included 'unfermented wines,' but that fact is not the less certain, because modern 
usage and taste have changed. (6) Because a modern dictionary cannot destroy 
the former meaning of antique words, but ought to preserve their respective and 
successive senses by careful induction of historical usage. (See Prel. Dis. p. xiv.) 
The Bible is not written in technical language, and the Encyclopcedia Americana 
(Boston, 1855) concedes that "the juice of grapes, when newly expressed, and 
before it has begun to ferment, is called must, and, in common language, sweet 
wine." And (7) Because the alleged fact is no fact at all. Peckmez, Nebidh, and 
Sakar, in various parts of the East, are still applied inclusively to zmFERMENTED 
liquors, as they were originally exclusively. — The article in the Bibliotheca is 
unworthy of the scholarship of our day.* It begins with a false translation of Pliny 
and ends with placing its criticism upon the authority of Gesenius. But in this 
age, no criticism can be left to repose upon authority; evidence alone is valid. 
Every material objection in the article, however, will be found to have been 
anticipated in the Commentary itself. In fact, Dr Laurie assumes all his facts, 
and begs all his principles. 

* The writer of the article in the Bibliotheca Sacra professes to be an abstainer, and even limits 
the use of wine medically to cases where prescribed by other than the patient himself. He describes 
wine also as dangerous, and prohibits its use by the young. He also concedes that there are traces 
of unfermented wine in classical history, especially as an article of luxury amongst the Romans. 
On other points, however, he is uncandid, uncritical, and inaccurate. He represents Dr Lees as 
having a teetotal bias in favor of interpreting tirosh as ' vine-fruit,' when in fact that bias, if it existed, 
would lead him to the theory that it was grape-juice, or ' new wine.' He conceals the fact also, that 
Gesenius, more than once, coincides with Dr Lees' view of the word. He conceals also the fact, 
that many eminent Hebrew scholars, such as Professor Murphy, of Belfast, and Dr Tayler Lewis, of 
Union College, repudiate as fanciful Gesenius' derivation of" tirosh, as what ' takes possession of 
the head.' We regret that any body's head should have been ' possessed' by a notion that had no 
support whatever in the actual usage of the word. As to bias, it is much more evident on the side 
where, in addition to mere theory (which holds of both opinions) there is also the instinct of conser- 
vatism, the motive of self-justification, and the bribery of" appetite. The Rev. Evelyn Hodgson, of 
Exeter College, Oxford, frankly confessed this in a recent controversy : — " A person coming to a dis- 
cussion of this kind, would be likely to collect the meaning of words, as used in passages, that would 
favor my side, and he would be more likely to be biased than the advocate of the other side " 
(abstinence). Now, scholars of eminence (some of whom have an admitted bias against teetotalism) 
have largely adopted the views of Dr Lees concerning tirosh, such as Professor Eadie, in his ' Bible 
Cyclopedia,' Prof. Douglas, in Principal Fairbairn's ' Imperial Bible Dictionary,' the late Dr 
Kitto, in his ' History of Palestine,' and Mr Bastow, in his ' Bible Dictionary.' On the main point, 
indeed — the only one which really concerns the Temperance Cause — namely, the generic character 
of y ay in — even the ablest critics upon Dr Lees have granted his position. Professors Eadie and 
Murphy admit that yayin does include grape-juice within its comprehension, and Bevan, in Dr 
Smith's great ' Bible Dictionary,' says :— " It MAT AT ONCE BE CONCEDED THAT THE HEBREW 
TERMS TRANSLATED ' WINE,' REFER OCCASIONALLY TO AN UNFERMENTED LIQUOR." 



INDEX 



[The Roman numerals (i, ii, iii, etc.) refer to the paging down to the end of the 
Preliminary Dissertation; the common numerals (i, 2, 3, etc.) refer to the 
paging of the Notes and the rest of the work. 



Aaron — he, his sons, and successors for- 
bidden to use wine and strong drink 
during their ministrations, 36. Re- 
ferences to this law by Josephus, 209, 
364; and by Philo, 210, 364. 

Abbreviations — marks of, employed, 
Ii. 

A' Beckett, Sir W. — lines by, under the 
motto, In Vino Falsitas, 146. 

Aben Ezra — on the use of vinegar, yj. 
His allusion to Belshazzar's feast, 214. 

Abib — the Hebrew civil month (identical) 
with the ecclesiastical month Nisan), 
and corresponding to part of our 
March and April, 31. 

Abigail — her gifts to David, 82. 

Abimelech — cursed by the Shechemites 
when feasting, 71. 

Abraham — his defeat of the confederate 
kings, 11. Met by Melchizedek, 11. 
Entertains angels, 12. Sends forth 
Hagar and Ishmael, 14. Dispute of 
his servants with Abimelech about a 
well, 14. Progenitor of the Rechab- 
ites, 192. 

Absalom — his plot against Amnon, 86. 

Absinthe — its nature and where manu- 
factured, 390 (also foot-note). 

Abstainers, eminent, in ancient times — 
Nazarites, 44, 203. Samson, 72. 
Samuel, 79. Rechabites, 192. Daniel, 
213. Therapeutas, 257. John the 
Baptist, 267, 292. Timothy, 272 — 274. 

Abstemice — who were so styled, and why, 

369- 
Abstinence from intoxicating drink — 
falsely charged with asceticism, x. A 
law of Paradise, 7. Practiced by the 
Israelites in the desert, 60. Divinely 
sanctioned as a safeguard against sin, 
38, 44, 320, 347. Conducive to health 
and strength, 72, 175, 203, 213. A 
guarantee of sobriety, 80. Conducive 



to mental clearness and vigor, 143. 
A doctrine of antiquity, 192, 252. A 
powerful instrument of Christian use- 
fulness, 263. Of great importance to 
the sober, 264. A. means of moral 
development, 271, 296. A noble form 
of Christian self-denial, 272. A mani- 
festation of true temperance, 316-7,388. 

Abulwalid — on qubaatk, 176. 

Abuse of God's bounties — wherein it 
consists, 16. How associated with the 
manufacture of intoxicating drinks, 370. 

Abyssinian Church — its use of raisin 
wine at the Lord's Supper, 277, 282. 

Acharistione — onvinum murrinian, 440. 

Achilles Tatius — Greek legend related 
by, 181. 

Achlub and Acklus — their supposed 
connection with khaklili, 23. 

Adam and Eve— in paradise, 5, 6, 7. 

Adam — ' Book of Adam ' quoted, 160. 

Adunamon (Adynamon) — an unintoxi- 
cating wine, 374. 

iEschylus — his use of neephalion and 
neephon, 363. His reference to wine 
in the grape, 433. 

Africanus — his notice of oil- wine, 297. 

Agaptz (love-feasts) — their abuse in the 
early Church, 339, 342. 

Ahasuerus — his sumptuous entertain- 
ment, 108. His decree against a fixed 
rule of drinking, 109. His command, 
when ' merry with wine, ' concerning 
Vashti, no. His feast in Esther's 
honor, drinking with Haman, and 
presence at Esther's banquet, in. 

Ahsis (fresh-juice) — its derivation and 
use in Scripture, xxvii, xl. See 

Appendices B 416, C 431, and D 441. 

Aigleuces — Pliny's definition, 439. 

Ainsworth — on the Nazarites' vow, 44. 

Alcahal — a powder for the eyebrows, 
supposed to have suggested the name 
of alcohol, 23. 



448 



INDEX. 



Alcibiades — speech ascribed to, by 
Plato, 363. 

Alcohol — its poisonous action, xii. Does 
not exist in grapes, xlii. Theory 

that it arrests the transformation of* 
tissue, xliv (foot-note). Is formed by 
the decomposition of sugar, 3. Its 
chemical composition not a food, or 
an equivalent to food, but a poison and 
prolific cause of disease and death, 4. 
Supposed derivation of the name, 23. 
The physical cause of intemperance, 
261. Excites thirst, 275, The quan- 
tity annually consumed at the Lord's 
Supper in England, 286. A shroud 
to the mind, 471. 

Alcoholic fermentation — signs of, 136-7. 

Aleppo (Helbon) — 209. 

Alexander the Great — his drunken mad- 
ness, 270. 

Alfieri — on vino, etc., xl. 

Alford, Dean — on avoidance of the occa- 
sions of evil desire, 264. On chreestos, 
294. On Luke v. 39, p. 294. His 
charges against the Temperance move- 
ment in his Notes on the miracle at 
Cana, 306. On methud, 341, and the 
original sense and apostolic use of 
neepho, 364, 365. On the appearance 
(eidos) of evil, 366. On the ravages 
of ardent spirits, 390. 

Alexis — his ' Fanatic ' quoted, xxxvi. 

Allen's ' Modern Judaism ' — on the wine 
of the passover, 283. 

Alsop, R. — on the use of grape-juice 
syrup in France, xxxviii. 

Alliance News, The — quotation from, on 
armor-plate rolling without intoxi- 
cating drinks, 175. 

Amalekites — when feasting, overtaken 
by David, 84. 

Amen-em-an — his letter to Penta-our on 
the use of wine, 20. 

Amnon — his murder, when ' merry with 
wine,' 86. 

Amphictyon — the king of Attica, who 
taught his people to mix water with 
wine, 54. 

Amphora — its size and shape, 81. 

Amphis — quoted, xxxvii. 

Anacreon — on oinos (wine) in the grape, 
22, 70, Appendix C431. His use of 
methud, 341. His exhortations to 
vinous indulgence, 344. 

Ancient wines — recipes for making, 435. 

Anna the prophetess — styled by St 
Cyril ' a most religious ascetic,' 317. 

Anstie, Dr — on alcohol and other drugs, 
xliv ; see also foot-note. 

Antediluvians — whether acquainted with 
intoxicating drinks, 8. Their sen- 
suality, 274, 299. 



Apocrypha (The) — quoted (1 Mace. vi. 
34) 181, (1 Esdr. hi. and iv.) 187. 

Apollonius — on the derivation of neepho, 
362. 

Apostolic Canons (The) — approved of 
asceticism for moral ends, 253. 

Appetite for intoxicating drinks — unna- 
tural, 381. 

Apple — why supposed to be the forbid- 
den fruit, 7. Comprehensi\ 
of ancient words 



153 



nsive meanings 
translated 'apple,' 



Apsinthos (wormwood), 390. 

Aquila — the friend of St Paul, 315. 

Aquila's Greek Version of the Hebrew 
Bible — quoted, 3, 23, 52, 53, 57, 60, 
62, 82, 83, 84, 117, 119, 120, 121, 124, 
130, 131, 133, 134, 135, 136, 143, 151, 
156, 158, 159, 167, 169, 170, 171, 185, 
340 (foot-note). 

Aquinas, Thomas — on grape-juice having 
the specific nature {species) of wine, 
and being therefore properly used in 
the Lord's Supper, xxxix, 285. 

Arabic Version of the Hebrew Bible — 
quoted, 10, 22, 47, 52, 53, 55, 57, 65, 
70, 77, 82, 94, 104, 115, 120, 142, 
155, 160, 165, 169, 170, 171, 203, 206, 
217, 218, 222, 231, 233, 246. 

Arcadia — wines as thick as honey, 295. 

Aristophanes — compared soldiers with 
foxes, 152. His use oineephontes, 363. 

Aristotle — quoted, on the wines of Ar- 
cadia, 295. Definition of Temper- 
ance, 322. 

Arrows — drunk (drenched) with blood, 
64. 

Artaxerxes — his notice of Nehemiah's 
sadness, 193, 194. 

Asceticism — ancient practice and ap- 
proval of, 253. True and false forms 
distinguished, 317. Dr Eadie's and Dr 
Howson's remarks upon, 317 (foot- 
note). 

Ashantee — its king's drink-offering of 
blood, 118. 

Ashishah — explained, xxxi. See Ap- 
pendix B, 417. 

Asotia — dissoluteness, 355, 385. 

Athenseus — his Deipnosophistae quoted, 
extracts from Alexis, xxxvi; from 
Cratinus, Amphis, and Damoxenus, 
xxxvii. On the sweet wine of the Mit- 
ylenians, xl. On Egyptian wines, 1 7. 
On the voyage of Nymphodorus, 198. 
On excessive drinking usages, 231. On 
sacrifices without wine offered to the 
sun, 363 (foot-note). On a saying of 
Philip of Macedon, 364 (foot-note). 
On Chian, Bibline, and Lesbian wines, 
374. Various sorts of wine, 435 - 437« 

Athens — periodical drunkenness of, 352. 



INDEX. 



449 



AthencEum — its misrepresentations, 2. 

Athletes — ancient and modern training 
of, on the abstinence principle, 333 ; 
also foot-note. 

Atlas works, Sheffield — total abstinence 
of workmen employed in, 175. 

Augustine, St — his charge of inconsist- 
ency against the Manichaeans, 251, 
253. On Psa. iv. 7, p. 117. Describes 
Noah as edrius, not ebriosus, 275. On 
the subjection of the body to the spirit, 
296. His exposition of the miraculous 
conversion of water into wine at Cana, 

3°5- 

Austria — abstemious habits of the wo- 
men, 369. 

Authority — not to be implicitly accepted 
in the interpretation of Scripture, xvii. 

Avenanus, Dr— on ahsis, xl. 



B 

Baal Hatturim — on * wine in the grapes' 
at Pentecost, xxvi. On the exclusion 
of honey from offerings by fire, 34. 

Babylon — association of its fall with in- 
temperance, 164, 200, 215. Its 'cup ' 
one of drunkenness and madness, 200. 
Its luxuriousness in the time of Daniel, 
211. Mystical Babylon and her raging 
wine, 391-393- 

Bacchanalian festival, 208. Excesses at 
Athens, 352. 

Bacchus — legend of his interview with a 
shepherd, 181. His name of Leenian 
from leenos (wine-press), 273. His 
Greek name Dionysos, 350. Wineless 
sacrifices sometimes offered to him, 
363. Unfermented wine poured out 
to him, 433. 

Bacchylides — on the effects of wine, 159. 

Bacon, Lord — on wines gently expressed 
compared to Scripture doctrine, xl. 

Badatschon wormwood, 203. 

Bags with holes — modern illustration of, 

243- 

Bagster's ' Treasury Bible ' — quoted on 
Samson's abstinence, 72-3. On the 
pomegranate, 81. On Jonadab and 
the Rechabites, 193. 

Balaam — his sin, and its modern coun- 
terpart, 389. 

Banquetings (potoi, * drinkings '), 385. 

Barclay, Dr — his theory that unfermented 
wine cannot be preserved, xxxviii. 

Barsom — a Persian plant, 205. 

Bartenora Rabbi — on drinking less of 
boiled wine, xxvi, 279. On the tra- 
dition that the juices of fruits do not 
ferment, 379. 

Bate, Julius, M.A. — on tiros h as grapes, 
xxviii. 

57 



Bath — a Hebrew fluid measure = 7 gals. 

4 pints English, 98, 159. 
Beale, Dr — on alcohol not a food, xlvi. 
Beefsteak — its nutritious value 156 times 

greater than that of wine, 370. 
Beer (well), 48. 
Beer — supposed reference to, in Isaiah, 

163. 
Belshazzar — his profane feast and death, 

214. 
Bengel's Notes — on kainon (new), 278. 

On Mary's address to Jesus, 302. On 

1 Cor. xi. 21, p. 341. On Ephes. v. 

18, p. 352. 
Benhadad — ' drinking himself drunk,' 

88. 
Benisch, Dr — his version of Prov. xxxi. 

5, 6, p. 143. On tirosh, 217. On ashi- 

shah, 219. On Hos. iv. 18, p. 220. 

On Hos. vii. 5, p. 221. On Hab. ii. 

5, p. 239. On Hab. ii. 15, p. 240. 
Benjamin of Tudela — his account of the 

Rechabites in the twelfth century, 195 -6. 
Benjamites — concealed in the vineyards, 

Benson, J. — on figurative wine, 391. 
Beth-haccerem, 104, 184. 
Bethlehem— the well of, 87. 
Beza's Latin Version of the New Testa- 
ment — quoted, 267, 275, 278, 287, 295, 

353- 

Bhadoon — wine-vats in, xxx. 

Bible (The) — not accountable for the 
errors and abuses it has been used to 
support, ix. How its testimony on 
the subject of strong drink is liable to 
perversion, xviii. Composed in the lan- 
guage of daily life, xxi. Not an 
exhausted book, xxxiii. 

Bibline wine, 374. 

Bibliotheca Sacra — fallacies, 446-7. 

Bingham's ' Antiquities of the Christian 
Church ' — quoted and examined, 277, 
280. 

Bishops — cautions addressed to, 367, 
368, 377- 

Bishop's Bible (1568 A. D.) — quoted, 
xxxi. 

Bland — his translation of lines by Ibycus, 
xxiv. 

Blayney, Dr — on gizrahtham, 204. 

Bloomfield, Dr S. T.— Notes on the 
training of athletes for the Grecian 
games, 333. On the meaning of methud, 
341 ; also foot-note. On ■ all things 
lawful,' 330. On 'good creatures,' 
and 'eating with knowledge,' 370. 

Blount, B — on must as new wine, xli. 

Blunt, Professor J. J. — on the sins of 
Nadab and Abihu, 37. 

Boaz — his treatment of Ruth, 77. His 
heart merry, 78. 



450 



INDEX. 



Bocchoris — said to have reigned in Egypt 
766 b. c, and to have permitted kings 
to drink wine, 19. 

Bode, Baron — on the Persian shire ap- 
plied to honey of raisins, xxvi. 

Bottles — how made of skins, 186. How 
burst by fermenting wine, 116, 266, 
289, 293. See also Appendix B, 
under khameth, nebel, nod, p. 424. 

Boulduc — his hypothesis concerning Re- 
chab, 193. 

Bowring, Sir J. — on the wines of Leba- 
non, 224. 

Boyle, R. — on reserved discoveries in 
the Bible, xxxiii. 

Braga, third council of — its decree 
against the use of grape-juice in the 
Lord's Supper explained, 280. 

Brande, Professor — on the prevention of 
fermentation within the grape, 285. 

Brandy-and-salt panacea, 297. 

Bread — saving of flour when unfer- 
mented; no alcohol present after 
baking, 269. See Appendix B, under 
lekhern, 424. 

Bretschneider — his definition of neepho, 
362. 

Brinton, Dr — on the enervating effect 
of wine, 262 (foot-note). 

British Temperance League — offer of 
prize of ^50 for proof that alcohol 
exists in grapes, xlii. 

Brodie's (Sir B.) 'Psychological In- 
quiries ' — quoted, as to the abstinence 
of night nurses, 386. 

Brown, Professor Dr John — on an 
invitation of Christ, 384. On 
'watching unto prayer,' 386. On 
resistance of the devil by abstinence, 

387- 

Buckmaster's 'Elements of Physiology ' 
— quoted, on the connection of ab- 
stinence with training, 333 ( foot- 
note). 

Bunsen, E. — his theory of the Kenites, 
192. 

Burges — his translation of neephonta, 

363- 
Butler, Bishop — on undiscovered truths 

in the Bible, xxxiii. 
Butler (Pharaoh's) dream of, 16, 17, 

249. 
Butler, S. — his lines on the victims of 

the Flood and the wine-cup, II. 
Butter and buttermilk, 68. 
Buxtorf — his explanation of a Jewish 

saying, 170. 
Byron, Lord — lines by, on 'Circum- 
stance,' 6. On the value of water, 

88. 
Byzantius's Lexicon — definitions of nee- 

pha-i'os, neephalia, neephaliotees, 362. 



Cakes unfermented — see Appendix B, 
under matzoth, 421. 

Cakes of dried grapes — see Appendix B, 
under ashishah, 417. 

Calabria — boiled wines used in, xxviii. 

Callimachus — his comparison of wine to 
fire, 159. 

Calmet — his conjectural reading of Ezek. 
xix. 10, p. 206. 

Calvin — on Deut. xiv. 26, p. 54. On 
'wine of astonishment,' 120. On the 
address of Mary to Jesus, 302. On 
the meaning of astoia, 352. On ' Use 
no longer water,' etc., 372, 373. 

Camphire (cypress) — described, 150. 

Cana of Galilee — its situation, 301. Nar- 
rative of the miracle at, 301-304. 

Canaan — Noah's grandson, 10. 

Canaan — its fertility, 24, 25, 51, 52, 61, 

65, 93- 

Candlestick — extended meaning of the 
word, xxii. 

Carbonic acid — its explosive power when 
not allowed vent, xxxix. 116, 166. 
One of the poisonous products of 
saccharine fermentation, 3. How 
used in making unfermented bread, 
269. 

Carmel — 94. 

Carson, Rev. Dr A. — on the different 
senses of the same word in different 
situations, xix. 

Carthaginian law — favoring the disuse 
of wine, contrasted, by Plato, with 
the customs of Cretans and Lacedse- 
monians, 253. 

Carystius — quoted respecting a saying of 
Philip of Macedon, 364. 

Cato — on vinum pendens (hanging wine), 
xxv. On the wine pressed from grape- 
husks, 157. 

Census Report of 1851 — on the means 
of prolonging life, 183. 

Ceremonial uncleanness — distinguished 
from the physical qualities and moral 
tendencies of intoxicating drinks, 323, 

357. 
Chalybonium vinum — 209. 
Chambers' ' Cyclopaedia ' — on the explo- 
sive force of fermenting wine, xxxix. 

On the meaning of ' wine, ' xl. 
Chambers, Dr T. K. — on the action of 

alcohol in arresting vitality, 262. 
Changes in meaning of Oriental terms, 

444-446. 
Chaucer — simile concerning temptation, 

264 (foot-note). 
Cheerfulness — caused by tirosh, 70. The 

result of the Divine favor, 1 1 7. As 

arising from wine, 125. 



INDEX. 



451 



Cheever, Dr — his work on Slavery 

noticed, xxxv. 
Chemosh — the great idol of the Moabites, 

49- 

Chian wine, 374. 

Christ — see under Jesus Christ. 

Christianity — its first principles, and their 
power, if carried out, to banish evil 
from the world, 369. 

Christians — their self-conquest and self- 
control, 87, 295. Their duty as Good 
Samaritans, 298. Their obligations 
toward their brethren, 321 — 325, 332, 
337. To imitate Christ, 327, 338, 
346, 384. To avoid evil, 322, 330, 
366. To do all possible good, 351, 
356. To cultivate the strictest sobriety 
and self-restraint, 317, 334, 361. 

Christians of St John — their use of raisin- 
wine at the Lord's Supper, 280. 

Christians of St Thomas — their use of 
raisin- wine at the Lord's Supper, 280. 

Christian Spectator, The — version of 
Hab. ii. 15, 16, p. 240. 

Church (The) — has it ever erred in its 
interpretation of Scripture ? xxxiv. Its 
duty to recognize the agreement of 
Scripture with science ? xlviii. 

Church Article XXI. — quoted, xxxiv. 

Church of England Report on Intem- 
perance,»note, 269. 

Chusda, Rabbi — his statement of the 
drugged wine given to Jewish crim- 
inals, 291. 

Chrysostom, St — on the conversion of 
water into wine at Cana, 305. On 
'living water,' 309. On methtio, 341. 
On 'Use no longer water,' etc., 372. 

Chwolson, Professor — his translation of 
some ancient writings, 192. 

Cicero — quoted, concerning olives and 
vines, 389. 

Civil government — of Divine institution, 
and perverted when used to sanction 
the traffic in strong drink, 321. 

Claret grape — red color of the juice, 
1 80-1 (foot-note). 

Clarke, Dr Adam — on matzatz, 12. On 
the use of unfermented wine by the 
ancients, 19. On debash (honey), 20. 
On the priests being prohibited to use 
wine during their ministrations, 37. 
On the Nazarites, 204. On the train- 
ing of candidates for the Grecian 
games, 333. On the meaning of 
met hud, 341. On swallowing down 
strong drink and being swallowed 
down by the devil, 386. 

Claudius Caesar — his intemperance, 313. 

Clemens Alexandrinus — on the benefit 
of abstinence, and effects of wine, xliv. 
352. On St Matthew as included 



among the enkratites, 253. On the 
sense of methud, 341. On asotia, 
352. 

Clergy — forbidden by the ante-Nicene 
canons to visit Inns except on a jour- 
ney, 367. 

Club-feasts — in ancient times, 338, 353. 

Codex Aleph (New Testament) referred, 
to — 265, 267, 274, 276, 287, 289, 290, 
291, 293, 294, 295, 299, 300, 301, 
302, 313, 328, 367, 372, 381, 385. 

Codex A * (N. T.) referred to — 289, 290, 
291, 294, 300, 313, 328, 338, 343, 
367, 372, 381. 385, 393. 

Codex B (N. T.) referred to— 265, 267, 
274, 276, 287, 289, 290, 291, 293, 
294, 299, 300, 313, 328, 357, 381, 
383, 385, 393. 

Codex C (N. T.) referred to— 265, 274, 
276, 287, 289, 290, 291, 293, 294, 
299, 300, 313, 328, 393. 

Codex D (N. T.) referred to — 261, 263, 
265, 266, 274, 276, 287, 288, 289, 
290, 291, 293, 294, 295, 298, 300, 
313, 328, 338, 348, 367, 372. 

Codex Z (N. T.) referred to— 265, 266, 
276, 287. [Codex Z includes only St 
Matthew's Gospel.] 

Colenso, Dr — his quibble as to 'hare,' 
xxi. His unsound argument respect- 
ing succah, xxi. On the wider sense 
of bechor and khag, xxii. On kha- 
mushim, xlvi. 

Collins' ' Voyages ' — quoted, xxvi. 

Collins, Wilkie — on the effects of wine, 
xliv. 

Columella — on defrutum turning sour, 
xxvi, 220. On wine from grape-husks, 
157. His receipt for making oil-wine, 
297. Other wines, 434-440. 

Comus (the god of revelry) — 49, 322. 

'Comus' (Milton's) — quoted, 13, 317. 

Connelly's 'Spanish Dictionary' — quot- 
ed, xxvi. 

Conscience — a violation of it sinful, 326, 
327. A tender regard for the con- 
sciences of others to be cherished, 336. 

337- 
Conversion of water into wine — at Cana, 
302. Annually effected in nature, 

305- 
Conybeare and Howson's ' Life and 
Letters of St Paul' — quoted, on the 
Essenes, 258. On ' Awake to right- 
eousness,' 345. On Ephes. v. 18, p. 
353- 



* Codex A of the N. T. does not commence 
till Matt. xxv. 6, and is less frequently referred 
to in the body of this Commentary, because 
more generally in accordance with the Received 
Greek Text of Stephens. On p. 265, 1. 25, « A * 
is a misprint for ' Z. ' 



452 



INDEX. 



Cook, Eliza — lines by, on the value of 
water, 127. 

Coptic Church (Egyptian) — the wine 
used by, at the Lord's Supper, 282. 

Corinth — intemperance of, 329. 

Corinthian Church — reproved by St Paul 
for their manner of celebrating the 
Lord's Supper, 338-342. 

Corn — waste of, in the manufacture of 
alcoholic liquors, 4. This waste more 
hurtful than withholding corn, 132. 

Coverdale's version of N. T. (a.d. 1535) 
— xxxi. 

Cowper, W. — his lines on licensed drink- 
shops, 321. On the perversion of 
Scripture to sensual purposes, 355. 

Cranmer's version of N. T. (a. d. 1539) 
—quoted, 275, 303, 322, 328, 333, 
355, 372. 

Cratinus — quoted, xxxvu. 

Crashaw, Richard — his lines on the 
miracle of Cana, 308. 

Cucumbers, wild — 91. 

Cumming, Rev. Dr — on the difference 
between Divine sufferance and sanc- 
tion, xxiii. 

Cunningham, Professor — on the use of 
raisin-wine at the passover, 283. 

Cup — of retribution, 122, 176, 177, 187, 
200, 204, 206, 207, 241, 247. Of 
'consolation,' 186. Of cold water, 
266, 289. Of the Lord's Supper, 275. 
290, 300, 343. See also Appendix B, 
under kos, poteerion, 424, 430. 

Cup-bearer — to Pharaoh, 16. To Arta- 
xerxes, 103. 

Cyclops Works at Sheffield — workmen 
employed at, who abstain from strong 
drink, 175. 

Cyprian, St — his plea for mixing water 
with the wine of the Lord's Supper, 
279. 

Cyrus the Great — the story of his refusal, 
when a boy, to taste wine, 215. His 
capture of Babylon, 215. His reported 
address to his chiefs before Babylon, 
361. 



Dagleish — his patent for making unfer- 
mented bread, 269. 

Dahgan, ' corn ' — meaning of, xxix. See 
Appendix B, 424. 

Damoxenus — quoted, xxxviii. 

Daniel — refusing the king's meat and 
wine, 211. Successful trial of pulse 
and water, and lessons of the experi- 
ment, 212, 213. His use of wine in 
later years, 215, 216. 

David — his visit to Saul's camp, 82. 
His march against Nabal, 82. His 



surprise of Saul, 83. His surprise of 
the Amalekites, 84. His gifts to the 
people, 85, 96. His base treatment 
of Uriah, 85. His supplies from Me- 
phibosheth, 86. His refusal to drink 
the water brought from the well of 
Bethlehem — a lesson for Christians, 
87. Mocked by the drinkers of sha- 
kar, 121. 

Davidson, Dr — on the uncertainty attend- 
ing the use of words, xxiii. 

Deacons — may they marry two wives ? 
xxxvii. Not 'to be given to much 
wine,' 368. Their wives to be ' sober,* 

369- 

Death — 'in the pot,' 91. 

Defilement — promoted by strong drink, 
270, 271. 

De Foe, D. — on the Englishman's love 
of beer, 176. 

Defrutum (grape-juice boiled down to a 
third of its bulk), xxvii, 439. 

Deipnon, ' chief meal,' 'supper,' 214, 
337. See also under 'Lord's Supper.' 

Delavan, E. C. — his testimony as to the 
preservation of fresh grapes in Italy 
from season to season, 278. Letter 
to, from M. M. Noah, as to the nature 
of passover wine, 282. 

Demetrius of Ephesus — his craft and 
modern disciples, 316. 

De Quincey, T. — on undue confidence 
in the English Version, xviii. His no- 
tice of the Essenes, 254. 

Devil (diabolos), 386. 

D'Herbelot — on the derivation of syrup, 
etc., xxii. 

Dindorf— on the root of yayin, xxv. On 
intoxicating yayin, xxvi-vii. On yitz- 
har, xxix. On the Hebrew gath, 202. 

Diodorus Siculus — on the use of wine by 
the kings of Egypt, 19. On the Na- 
bathaeans, 1 79. On the fall of Nine- 
veh, 238. 

Dioscorides — on sapa, xl. 

Dipsomania, 262, 275. 

Doddridge, Dr— on Ephes. v. 1 8, p. 352. 
On the allocation of I Tim. v. 23, p. 

373- 
Donnegan's Lexicon — definition of nee- 

pho, 362. 
Donovan, Professor — on the preserva- 
tion of ancient wines by evaporation 

and concentration, 295. 
Dough — waste of, by fermentation, how 

avoided, 269. 
Douglas, Professor — on the meaning of 

ahsis, xxvii. On tirosh, xxix. On 

ashishah, xxxi. 
Dregs of wine, 196, 199, 242. 
Drimacus — gathering 'wine' from the 

fields, 198. 



INDEX. 



453 



Drinking — for mere pleasure, the essence 
of intemperance, 322. Not an anti- 
dote to trouble, 80, 144. 

' Drink no longer water, ' etc. — explained, 

372-374- 

Drink-offering (z. e. an offering of drink, 
a libation) — see Appendix B, under 
Nesek, 424. 

Drugged wines — whether used by Noah, 
10; or by Lot, 13. Mentioned by 
Homer, and common in the East, 13. 
Symbolic of the Divine anger, 122, 
123. [See under 'Cup.'] Said to have 
been offered to criminals before execu- 
tion, 144, 287 (and foot-note), 291. 

Druitt, Dr — on alcohol as a mere drug, 
xli. 

Drunk, drunken — derivation of the 
terms, 10. 'To add to the thirsty,' 
61. Use of the terms explained, 303, 

339-341- 

Drunkard — Jewish law concerning, 57. 
The Mishna's definition, 57. Des- 
tined to poverty, 135. Solomon's 
description of, 135, 136. His hand 
pierced with a thorn, 142. Called to 
awake and weep, 225. Not to be 
associated with by Christians, 329. 
Excluded from the kingdom of God, 

3 2 9- 

Drunkenness — of Noah, 9 ; of the As- 
syrian marauders, 11; of Lot, 13; of 
Nadab and Abihu, 36 ; of Nabal, 83 ; 
of Elah, 89; of Benhadad, 89; of 
priests and prophets, 170; of the 
Israelites, 159, 160, 169, 178, 221, 225, 
229, 231, 235, 239 ; of heathen na- 
tions, 214, 233, 238, 245. Threaten- 
ings on account of, 188, 200, 233, 241. 
Wherein it essentially consists, 322. 

Drusius — on tirosh, xxviii. On khamak, 
xlvii. 

Du Fresne, Carolo — on vinum coctum, 
etc., xl. 

Dunbar's Lexicon — definition of neepho, 
362. 

Dupuis's 'Journey to Ashantee' — 118. 



Eadie, Dr — his ' Bible Cyclopaedia ' 
quoted, xxxi. On the ancient sense 
of asceticism, 317. On the apposition 
between fulness of wine and of the 
Spirit, 353. 

Earth — represented as ' hearing ' her 
offspring, 218. 

' Eating and drinking ' — various appli- 
cations of the phrase, 266, 274, 275, 
295-6, 298-9. 

Ebrius — explained, 9. Distinguished 
from ebriosus, 275. 



The Echo — its foolish criticism, 2. 

Eclectic Review — on the blinded under- 
standing, xix. 

Economy — violated by the manufacture 
of intoxicating drinks, 4, 132. Illus- 
trated in the miracle of the loaves and 
fishes, 309. 

Eden, garden of — trial and temptation 
in, 5, 6. Abstinence practiced in, 7. 

Edomites — drunken, 204. Destroyed, 

233- 

Edward, Prince (Edw. I.) — some of his 
soldiers in Palestine died from ex- 
cessive use of honey, 141. 

Egypt — culture of the vine, time of vint- 
age, and manner of wine-making, 17, 
48, 125. Beer of, supposed to be 
referred to, 163. An intoxicating 
mixture suplied to, 164. 

Egyptians, ancient — acquainted with the 
vine, 17, 48, 125. Intemperance of, 
17. Use of palm wine and beer, 18. 
Whether their kings used wine; cus- 
toms of their priests ; and exclusion of 
wine from the Temple of the Sun, 19. 
Their legend of the origin of wine; 
letter of Amen-em-an against wine- 
drinking, 20. Affection for the Nile, 
28. A fainting Egyptian refreshed 
with food and water. 81. Remarkable 
custom adopted at their feasts, 344. 

Ekneepsate — explained, 10, 83, 225, 345. 

Elah — ' drinking himself drunk, ' 89. 

Eli — his misapprehension of Hannah's 
grief, 79. 

Elijah — supplied with water of the 
brook, 89. Supposed to have been a 
Nazarite, 89. 

Ellicott, Bishop — on the danger of im- 
porting foregone conclusions into the 
exposition of Scripture, xxxii. On 

the recognition by modern expositors 
of great principles of justice and truth, 
xxxiv. 

' Encyclopaedia Britannica ' — on the 
passover wine, 283. 

Engedi, vineyards of — Jewish legend 
concerning, 151. 

Enkratites (temperates = abstainers) — 
said to have included St Matthew, St 
Peter, and St James, 253. Their 
opinion of wine, 253. 

Epaminondas — address to his soldiers, 
361. 

Ephraim — drunkards of, 169. Its princes 
and king corrupted by wine, 222. 

Epicharmus — a maxim of his cited, 364. 

Epictetus — on the training of candidates 
for the Grecian games, 333. 

Epiphanius — on the stoning of St James, 
195. On the enkratites, 253. On the 
Sabaeans being Essenes, 256. 



454 



INDEX. 



I Esdras iii.-iv. — on the power of wine, 
xliv, 187. 

Eshkol — see Appendix B, 420. 

Essenes — theories concerning their ori- 
gin, 254. Their discipline and regi- 
men, as described by Josephus, 254 ; 
and by Philo, 255. 

Esther — feast in her favor; her feast to 
Ahasuerus, in. 

Ethiopic Version — quoted, 120, 124, 

372, 373- 

Eubulus — on the effect of water and of 
wine, xliv. 

Eucharist — meaning of, as applied to 
the Lord's Supper, 276. 

Eudoxus — on the use of wine by the 
kings of Egypt, 19. On the Egyptian 
tradition of the origin of wine, 20. 

Eumenides — wine excluded from their 
sacrifices, and why, 363. 

Europeans — their intercourse with un- 
civilized aborigines often a great curse, 
337 (and foot-note). 

Eusebius — quoted, 195, 314. 

Evangelical Magazine (The) — quotation 
from, on allusions to wine in Scripture, 
137. On the free use of wine in the 
celebration of the Lord's Supper, 281. 

Evil communications — corrupt good 
manners, 344.. 

Evil — in all aspects to be avoided, 366. 

Ewald — on Hos. iv. 18, p. 221. 

Exercise — synonymous with self-disci- 
pline, 317. 

Expedient — popular mistake as to the 
sense in which St Paul uses the word 
so translated, 330. What is not ex- 
pedient is not lawful, 331, 332. 

Experience — its testimony concerning 
strong drink, xlv. 

Experiment — its evidence as to strong 
drink, xlv. 

Eyes — 'red with wine,' how to be un- 
derstood, 22-24. Colloquial sense 
of the words ' eye ' and ' eyes ' illus- 
trated, 24. Redness of, a sign of in- 
temperance, 136. 

Ezra — his abstinence from water, 102. 



Fabricius — his report of a legend con- 
cerning Noah and the vine, II. 

Fabroni — his explanation why grape- 
juice does not ferment in the grape, 
defective, xxxix. 

Fairbairn's ' Imperial Bible Dictionary ' 
— quoted, xxvii, xxxi. 

Feast — provided by Abraham, 12; by 
Lot, 12; of unleavened bread, 27, 
275 ; ofNabal, 82; of Ahasuerus, ill; 
of Job's children, 113; of fat things 



and preserves, 167; ofBelshazzar, 214; 
of tabernacles, 310. See also Appen- 
dix B under khag, misteh, 424. 

Felix — his character, and St Paul's ap- 
peal to, 318. 

Ferment — its use and presence during 
the passover season prohibited, 27-29, 
31-39, 45, 50-56, 279-281. Its sym- 
bolic applications, 27, 269, 271-2, 281, 
285, 328. Philo's explanation of the 
prohibition, 249. Rabbinical theory 
that the juices of fruits do not ferment, 
28, 280. The priests of Jupiter for- 
bidden to touch leaven, 29. 

Fermentation — does not occur in grapes, 
xliii. Not the result of a vital pro- 
cess, xliii. The nature of it ex- 
plained, 3. Signs of, 136-7. How 
prevented, 168. Not to be ascribed 
to the ' fruit of the vine,' 281 ; or to 
the wine made at Cana, 304. Deteri- 
orating to the richness of grape-juice, 
370. 

Fermented wine — arguments for and 
against the use of, at the Lord's Sup- 
per, stated and considered, 377-383. 
Whether was permitted at the Jewish 
passover, 280-1. Evidence as to its 
use and disuse by ancient and modern 
communities, 281-283. 

Fig tree, 88, 151, 184. See also Ap- 
pendix B, under theanah, 425. 

Fire waters — to be avoided, 131. A 
name justly applied to ardent spirits, 
390- 

Florence — unfermented wine imported 
from, xxxviii. 

Food — man's duty in regard to it, 3. 
Waste of, in the manufacture of fer- 
mented and distilled liquors, 4. Such 
waste a great abuse, 16. Food (truly 
so called) not to be used so as to en- 
danger the consciences of Christians, 

323-325 5 337- 
Forerius — on shemahrim, xxxi. 
France — boiled wines extensively used 

in, xxviii, xxxviii. 
Francis, Dr — his translation of lines by 

Horace, 333. 
Frey, Rev. C. H. — on exclusion of fer- 
mented drink from passover, 282. 
Fruit of the vine — the terms explained, 

277, 283, 285. In the Lord's Supper, 

270, 290, 300. See under tirosh, 414. 
Frankland, Capt. — on stone wine-presses 

at Solima, xxx. 
Forbidden fruit in the garden of Eden 

— supposed intoxicating quality and 

effects of, 7. 
Fortune — goddess of, worshiped, 182. 
Foxes (or jackals) — their devastations in 

vineyards, 152. Used as food, 152. 



INDEX. 



455 



Fraser, Professor — on the Divine ideas 
in nature becoming a fact of human 
experience, xliii. 

Freund, Dr W. — example of the different 
senses of arena, xxiii, xxiv. On vinde- 
mia, vinum, and mustum t xli. 

Fuerst's Hebrew and Chaldee Concord- 
ance quoted — on shakar, xxxi j on 
soraq, 22. 

Fury of God — symbolized by intoxicat- 
ing wine, 122, 176, 188, 200, 204, 
241, 391-3. 

Full — also drunken; illustration from 
the French soul, 427. Shakar, in 
'sense of filled, 9, 152, 243. Melhuso 
=ebrius, as filled or satiated, 9, note ; 
applied to arrows, 64; to cup, 1 19; 
to fatness, 119; to furrows, 120. [See 
422 for raveh, etc. ] Used by Symma- 
chus, 132; Septuagint, 152; St John, 
303, 340-I ; metheen, 243. 



Galen — on foxes as food when fattened 
on grapes, 152. On oil-wine, 297. 

Gall — see Appendix B, under rosh and 
cholee, 423, 429. 

Gardens — greatly valued in the East, 

90, 147. 

Garments — washed in wine, 22. Dyed 
(= made bright), 180. 

Gedaliah — his command to gather wine, 
(yayin), 193. 

Gellius — on the priests of Jupiter being 
forbidden to touch leaven, 29. 

Gemaras (the two Commentaries on the 
Mishna, and constituting with the 
Mishna the chief books of the Tal- 
mud), 279. 

General Prefaces, ix. 

Geneva, English Version (A. D. 1557) — 
quoted, 303, 322, 328, 333, 335, 372. 

Germans, Ancient — their custom of de- 
liberating when drunk and deciding 
when sober, no. 

Gesenius — on tirosh, xxviii. On yitzhar, 
xxix. On yeqeb, xxx. On shakar, 10. 
On debash, 20. On khaklili, 23. On 
'liquor of grapes,' 42. On Chemosh, 
49. On rosh, 63. On hillulim, 71. 
On ashishah, 85. Onpaqquoth sahdeh, 

91. On karmel, 94. On abai, 117. 
On rahvah, 119. On methronon, 124. 
On presses ' bursting out ' with tirosh, 
129. On mashshak, 147. On kopher, 
150. On ' clusters of dates ' and 
khikhak, 153. On tirosh mourning, 
165. On Isa. xxv. 6, p. 167. On 
qubaath kos, 176. On gathering tirosh, 
180. On penninim, 203. On the use 
of Barsom, 205. On pathbag, 211. 



On Hos. vii. 14, p. 222. On kakhash, 
223. On hobish, 226. 

Gesner, J. M. — on vinum, etc., xl. 

Giddiness — as of a drunken man, 126. 

Gilbey — wine merchant's testimony to 
injurious effect of fermentation, 370. 

Gill, Dr — on khamah, xlvii. On the 
phrase 'the kernel to the husk,' 42. 
On the tendency of the Nazarites' vow 
to promote chastity, 44. On ' a glut- 
ton and a drunkard,' 57. On the 
milk given by Jael to Sisera, 68. On 
vinegar in harvest, 77. On Isa. i. 22, 
p. 157. On the inflammatory effect 
of wine, 159. On Belshazzar's feast, 
214. On 1 Cor. xi. 21, p. 341. On 
'use no longer water,' etc., 372. 

Gleaning — not by the owner of a vine- 
yard, 39, 59. Very limited, 162, 237. 
Described, 166, 185, 200. 

Gleukos — sweet wine, xxxix, 312-3. Va- 
rious kinds of, 374, 378. See also 
Appendix B, 425, C, 431, and D, 440. 

Glutton — Mosaic law concerning, 57. 
The Talmud ( Mishna' s) definition, 57. 
Condemned to poverty, 135. 

Gobat, Dr, Bishop of Jerusalem — his 
reference to Abyssinian wine and the 
species used at the Lord's Supper, 282. 

God — described as administering an in- 
toxicating potion to His enemies, 122, 
176, 177, 180, 185, 188, 199, 200, 
39 1 -3. Said to resemble a mighty 
man recovering himself from wine, 
124. The author of natural bounty, 
52, 55, 61, 65, 125-6, 217, 218, 227, 
228, 232, 236, 245, 246, 247. Not 
responsible for the products of human 
art and invention, 148, 315. His 
glory to be first sought in all human 
action, 337. 

Gomorrah — fields of, 62. 

Good creatures of God, 370. 

Good Samaritan — an application, 297. 

Goodwin, C. W. — his translation of an 
ancient Egyptian letter on wine, 20. 

Grace (Divine) — its office in the preven- 
tion of evil, 264, 306 (foot-note), 378. 

Grape-cure — called wein cur, xxvi. 

Grape-juice — entitled to the name of wine, 
xix, xxxix-xli. See Appendices C, 
D, 431-446. Theory of the Rabbins 
that it would not ferment, xx, xxv, 280. 
Color of, 180, 181. Not forbidden 
to be used as a common drink under 
the Christian dispensation, 343 (foot 
note). Injured by fermentation, 370 
(foot-note). Drunk by ladies and 
epicures, 378. 

Grapes — do not contain alcohol, xlii. 
Why their juice does not ferment, 
xliii. Blood of, 22. When first 



456 



INDEX. 



ripe in Palestine, 45. Great size of 
the bunches, 46 (also foot note). Value 
of, in the East, as food, 93. ' Sour 
grapes,' 1 14, 163, 189. In flower, 
152, 154. Wild (vile) grapes, 158. | 
See also Appendix B, under anahvim, 
eskkeloth, 420; stapkulee, botrus, 427. 

Grapes in February and March, 443. 

Grecian games — training of the candi- 
dates, 297. 

Greenfield W. — on • the cruel man, ' 122. 

Grief — not to be cured by strong drink, 
80, 186. 

Grote, G. — on the variable nature of 
truth, 326. 

Grotius — his rendering of khamak, 240. 

Gussetius — on mahal, 157. 

Guthrie, Dr— on the Rechabites, 195. 



H 

Hall, Bishop (Norwich) — on the con- 
version of water into wine at Cana, 

3°5- 

Halley, Dr — on I Cor. xi. 21, p. 341. 

Ham, Noah's son — his shameless con- 
duct, 10. 

Hammond, Dr— on methuo, 341. On 
'use a little wine,' 373. On money 
as a root of evil, 375. 

Hanna, Dr — on the reconciliation of 
Scripture texts, xliv. 

Hannah — her prayer and vow, 79. Her 
disclaimer of the use of wine and strong 
drink, 80. 

Harvey, Ven. Archdeacon (Lord) — on 
the dream of Pharaoh's butler, 18. 

Hassall, Dr — his report on Mr F. 
Wright's sacramental wine, xxxviii. 
(foot-note). 

Havernick— on be-dakmkak, 206. 

Haydock and Husenbeth's Notes on the 
Douay Version — quoted on Deut. xxix. 
19, p. 61. 

Hecatseus — on the use of wine by the 
kings and priests of Egypt, 19. 

Hector — his reply to Hecuba, 73. 

Hegesippus— quoted by Eusebius, as to 
the stoning of St James, 195. Tra- 
dition of the abstinence of St James 
from wine and strong drink, 314. 

Helbon — wine of, 208-9. 

Hellanicus — on the cultivation of the 
vine in Egypt, 17. 

Henderson, Rev. Dr E. — on Isa. xix. 10, 
p. 163. On Isa. xxviii. 9, 10, p. 172. 
On qubaath kos kataralak, 176. On 
Isa. lxiii. 6, p. 181. On skin-bottles 
at Tiflis, 186. On khamak, 188. On 
be-daktnkak, 206. On askiskah, 219. 
On Hos. iv. 18, p. 220. On Hos. vii. 
5, p. 221. On boqaq, 223. On Hos. 



xiv. 7, p. 224. On ahsis (fresh -juice), 
225. On tiroshy 237, 246 (criticised). 
On Nah. i. 10, p. 238. On Hab. 
ii. 5, p. 239. On Hab. ii. 15, p. 240. 
On iskrahkak, 243. On purak, 244. 

Henry, Matthew— on the special evil of 
drunkenness, 14. On the chief but- 
ler's dream, 18. On the Nazarite's 
vow, 44. On the profligate and 
drunken son, 57. On Samson's mo- 
ther's abstinence, 72. On Samson's 
strength, 73. On Ahasuerus' drink- 
ing with Haman, m. 

Herod Antipas — his rash promise, how 
probably caused, 270. 

Herodotus — on the absence of vines in 
Egypt, 17. His reference to oinos 
ampe linos, 18. On the use of wine 
by the kings and priests of Egypt, 19. 
On the love and use of wine by the 
Persians, 109, 363. On the fall of 
Babylon, 215. On a strange custom 
at Egyptian feasts, 344. 

Herschel, Sir John — on the different 
meanings of the same word, xxiii. 

Hesychius — his definition of leenos, xxx. 
his definition of neepho, neepkalioi t 
362. 

Hezekiah — an example to Christians, 92. 

Hindoos — one of their thirty-two chari- 
ties, the provision of water for the 
thirsty, 114. 

Hippocrates— on glukos, xxxix. His use 
of meelhtcstheenai, 340 (foot note). 

History — its voice on the influence of 
intoxicating drinks, xlv. 

Hobab — his connection with the Re- 
chabites, 192. 

Hogshead — suggested derivation of the 
word, 186. 

Holyoke, Dr — his longevity and cause 
of death, 183. 

Homer — on drugged wine, 13. The 
colloquy of Hector and Hecuba, 73. 
His use oimetkuousan, 341 (foot note). 

Homes, H. — on produce of vineyard in 
the East, 441. 

Honey — why forbidden to be used in the 
sacrifices of fire, 34. Proverbs con- 
cerning, 140, 141. See Appendix B, 
under debask, 424. 

Horace — extract from the Delphin edi- 
tion of his works, 168. Lines on 
training for the Grecian games, 323. 

Home, Dr T. H. — extract from his 
' Introduction to the study of the 
Scriptures,' on the nature of passover 
wine, 283. 

Horsley, Bishop — on the chief butler's 
dream, 16. On Hos. iv. 18, p. 220. 

Houses — to be built with battlemented 
roofs, 58. 



INDEX. 



457 



Isthmian games (celebrated near Corinth) 
— St Paul's allusion to, 333. 



Jaazaniah — head of the Rechabites when 
visited by Jeremiah, 194. 

Jackals — destructive to vineyards, 152. 
(See ' Foxes '.) 

Jacob — presenting wine to Isaac, 15. 
Pouring out a libation, 16. His 
blessing on Judah, 23. What is in- 
tended by his ' eye ' or ' fountain,' 65, 
250. His well at Sychar, 368. 

Jacob-ben-Ashir, Rabbi — on the neces- 
sary use of wine at the passover, 202. 

Jael — her gift of milk and butter to 
Sisera, 68. 

James the Just— -stoning of, 195. Re- 
puted to have drunk neither wine nor 
strong drink, 314. 

Jarchi, Rabbi — on the Nazarite's vow, 
44. On the use of vinegar, 77. On 
Belshazzar's feast, 214. 

Jebb, Bishop — on ' watching unto pray- 
ers,' 385. 

Jehoshaphat — his moral weakness a 
warning, 99. 

Jehudah (Yehudah=Judah), Rabbi — his 
approval of boiled wine, xxvi, 279. 
On the absence of a blessing over 
things originating in corruption, 218. 
The compiler of the Mishna, 277. 

Jeremiah — his interview with the Re- 
chabites, 190-7. 

Jerome, St — on his translation of bar as 
' son ' and * corn,' xxiii. On khamah, 
xlvii. On abstinence from wine, 38. 
On Psa. iv. 7, p. 117. On Psa. xxiii. 
5, p. 119. On 'wine of astonishment,' 
120. On Psa. lxix. 12, p. 121. On 
Psa. lxxiii. 21 and lxxv. 8, pp. 122-3. 
On Psa. ciii. 14, 15, p. 125. His 
remarkable rendering of Eccles. ii. 3, 
p. 147. On soraq, 158. 

Jesus Christ — His resistance of temp- 
tation, 261. His miracle at Cana by 
the conversion of water into wine, 301 
— 303. Nature of the miracle, 304. 
Extent of the miracle, 306. Primary 
objects of the miracle, 307. His asso- 
ciation of works of healing with the 
gospel, 263. His command to sacrifice 
what is most dear and useful physic- 
ally, for the safety of the soul, 263, 
273. The prayer He has taught us, 
not to be led into temptation, 265. 
His allusion to new wine and old 
bottles, 265, 289, 293 ; and to the pre- 
ference of old wine over new, 294-5. 
At Jacob's well, 368. His refer- 
ence to a cup of cold water, 266. 



Howson, Dr J. S. — on the value of the 

ascetic principle, 317 (foot-note). 
Howson and Conybeare — see Conybeare 

and Howson. 
Hungarian vintage — bursting of the ripe 

grapes, xxvii. 
Hunger — to be stayed before going to 

the Lord's Supper, 339. 
Huntington, Dr F. D. — on a regard for 

the consciences and welfare of others, 

33°-7- 
Hyssop, 288 

Ibycus — lines on the vine, translated by 
Bland, xxiv. 

Idols — burnt, to avert the sin of idolatry, 
52. Of Britain, 157. 

Index, 447. 

Inebriare, ' to inebriate ' — explained, 9, 
152, 175, 243. 

Instinct, natural — none for intoxicating 
drink, 5. 

Intemperate appetite — caused by the 
action of alcohol upon the nervous 
system, 261. Testimony of eminent 
philosophers concerning, 261-2 (foot- 
note). The risk of, to be avoided, 
262. 

Intoxicating drink — not approved in 
Scripture, xvii. An evil thing, xxxi. 
Produced by a waste of food, 3. The 
cause of enormous evils, 4. Not 
desired by the healthy natural appetite, 
5. Inflaming the animal passions, 13, 
320. Not entitled to the name of 
'meats,' 370. (See 'Abstinence,' 'Al- 
cohol'.) 

Interpreter (The) — on the Bible as an 
unexhausted mine, xxxiii. 

Inventions, human — not necessarily in 
accordance with the Divine will, 148. 

Isaac — his blessing of Jacob and Esau, 

IS- 

Isaacs, A. — his letter on the wine used 
by Jewish families in the celebration 
of the passover, 282-3. 

Isaiah — his descriptions and denuncia- 
tions of intemperance, 159, 160. 

Israelites — forbidden to use ferment at 
the passover, 27. Murmuring for 
water, 29. Permitted to drink yayin 
and shakar, 53. Did not drink wine 
or strong drink in the desert, 60. 
Their enjoyment under Solomon's rule, 
88. Their idolatry and sensuality in 
the wilderness, 249, 250. Their in- 
temperance in the later times of the 
monarchy, 159, etc. (See ' Drunken- 
ness '.) 

Italy — vinegar used in the harvest-field, 
77- 

58 



458 



INDEX. 



Jesus Christ — ( Continued ). The con- 
trast between His mode of life and 
John's no proof of His inferior self- 
denial, and no argument against the 
Temperance reform, 266-268, 295-6. 
Satan not divided against himself, 269. 
Leaven used as a symbol of Christ's 
kingdom, 269 ; and of the corrupt 
doctrine of the Pharisees and Sad- 
ducees, 271-2. His declaration that 
not that which goeth into the mouth 
defileth a man, 270-1. Self-denial a 
condition of discipleship with Him, 
272. His * woe to the world because 
of offenses,' 273. His command to 
* gather up the fragments, ' 309. His 
injunction to eat and drink whatever 
is given, 296. Parable of the Good 
Samaritan — who is our neighbor ? 
296-298. Parable of the sensualist, 

298. Warning against sensuality, 

299. Parable of the householder, 
who planted a vineyard, 273, 290, 299. 
Mention of Antediluvian sensuality, 
274, 299. The evil and drunken ser- 
vant, 274, 298. The reward of shew- 
ing love to Christ's afflicted poor, 275. 
His comparison of himself to water, 
309-310. His institution of the Lord's 
Supper, 275-6, 290, 300. What is 
meant by ' the fruit of the vine ' blessed 
by the Lord, 277, 280-1. His de- 
scription of Himself, ' I am the true 
vine,' 310. His rejection of wine 
mingled with myrrh or gall, 287, 291. 
His acceptance of vinegar on the 
cross, 287, 291, 300, 310-11. On a 
spiritual imitation of Christ, 337. On 
not knowing Him after the flesh, 346. 
Following Christ wisely as an example, 
348. 

Jewish legends — of the vine planted by 
Noah, 9. Of animal blood poured 
upon the root of Noah's vine, II. Of 
the wine given by Jacob to Isaac, 15. 
Of the cluster of grapes carried away 
by the spies, 46. Of the transmuta- 
tion of the vessels at Ahasuerus's feast, 
108. Of the angel of confusion sent 
to that feast, no. Of Rabba and 
Rabbi Zira keeping Purim, 1 12. Of 
the wine used in the wilderness, 151. 

Job — feasting of his children, and his 
sacrifices on their behalf, 113. 

John the Baptist — his course of life con- 
trasted with the Saviour's no valid 
objection to total abstinence, 266-7. 
The angelic command that he should 
be trained as a Nazarite, 292. 

Jonadab, the son of Rechab — his name, 
lineage, and history, 191-193. 

Jonah, Rabbi — on khamah, xlvii. 



Joseph — his interpretation of the chief 
butler's dream, 16. His brethren 
making merry with him, 21. 

Josephus — on Abraham's defeat of the 
confederate kings, II. His version of 
the chief butler's dream, 18. On the 
Hebrew kin, 32. On the apples of 
Sodom, 63. On the milk given to 
Sisera, 68. His wrong interpretation 
of the name ' Samson,' 72. His ac- 
count of Ahasuerus's feast, 109. On 
the command to the priests not to 
drink wine in the temple, 209, 364. 
His account of the Essenes, 254-256. 
His use of neepsis, 'abstinence,' 255. 
(foot-note). His account of fruits pre- 
served fresh for 100 years, 278. His 
use of the word neepho, 364. 

Jotham — his parable of the trees, 70. 

Jowett, Professor — his testimony to the 
early and wide adoption of abstinence 
principles, 253. 

Judah — his blessing by Jacob, 23. Cup 
of retribution supplied to, 207. 

Julius, Pope — his permission to use 
newly pressed wine in the Lord's 
Supper, 280. 

Justin Martyr — on the adoption of the 
name 'Eucharist,' 276. 

Juvenal — on the excessive use of sweet 
wine by Roman ladies, 138, 369. 



Ksempfer — on the thick juice of dried 
grapes, 20. 

Kalisch, Dr — on the use of the context 
in interpretation, xxi. On Melchize- 
dek's offering to Abraham, 12. On 
the chief butler's dream, 17. On ab- 
stinence from fermented wine by the 
kings of Egypt, 19. On Exod. xxii. 
29, p. 31. 

Keil and Delitzch — on ' the impious son,' 
58. 

Khag — extended sense of, xxii. 

Khamah, 'heat,' 'poison' — enumeration 
of passages, xlviii. See Appendix 
B, 423. 

Khamar — meaning of, xxviii. See Ap- 
pendix B, 414-6. 

Khemer — how applied to the juice of the 
grape, xx, xxviii. See Appendix B, 
416. 

Khomelz, ' vinegar, ' xxviii. See Appen- 
dix B, 421. 

Kimchi, Rabbi — on Hab. ii. 15, p. 240. 

Kindness — enjoined by the law of Moses, 
58, 59. Injuriously exhibited by gifts 
of strong drink, 275. 

Kings — whether those of Egypt used 
intoxicating liquor, 19. Indulgence in 



INDEX. 



459 



strong drink by, 88, 214, 270. Not 
fit for them to drink wine, 142. 

Kitto's 'Cyclopaedia of Biblical Litera- 
ture ' — referred to, xxxi (foot-note). 

Kitto's ' Pictorial Bible ' — on the mean- 
ing of tirosh, xxviii. On Melchizedek 
presenting bread and wine, 12. 

Knowledge — to be supplemented by 
temperance, 388. 

Kohl, J. G. — his notice of wormwood 
wine, 203. 

Komoi (re veilings) — their prevalence and 
apostolic condemnation, 349, 385. 

Koumiss — sour mare's milk, xxviii. 

Kuran (Koran) — quoted, 390. 



Lactantius — his citation from the Sibyl 

line Oracle, 232. 
Lallemand, Perrin, and Duroy — on the 

demarcation between alcohol and food, 

xliv. 
Lancet (The) — report on the nutritious 

value of wines, 370. 
Laurie, Dr — fallacies of, 445. 
Lavater — use of vinegar in Italy, 77. 
Law, Rev. W., M.A. — on the miracle 

at Cana, 306. The Saviour's design 

in its performance not physical, but 

spiritual, 308. 
Law-book of the Ante-Nicene Church — 

extract from, against the visiting of 

taverns by the clergy, 367. 
Lawful — actions cannot be such when 

not ' expedient ' ; St Paul's principle 

explained, 330. 
Laycock, Professor -on the formation 

of drinking habits, 262 (foot-note). 
Leaven — reason of its prohibition at the 

passover and in various sacrifices, 27, 

34. Symbolic use of it in the New 

Testament, 269, 271-2, 328. See 

'Ferment,' and Appendix B, under 

seor, kkamatz, and zumee, 421, 427. 
Lebanon, wines of, 224. 
Lee, Professor Dr S. — on the errors 

of lexicographers, xviii, xxxiv. On 

khaklili, 23, 24. 
Lees, Dr — on the diminished mortality 

of abstainers, xliv. 
Legend — of the vines that will grow in 

the millenium, 27. See also 'Jewish 

Legends. ' 
Lcenos, xxx. See Appendix B, 429. 
Lemuel — his name, etc., 143. 
Lesbos — ' innocent wine ' of, 166, 374. 
Lessing — on the education of the Jews, 

xlviiL 
Levy, Dr M. — on the effect of alcohol 

on the nervous system, xliv. 
Lewes, G. H. — his characterization of 

alcohol, 262 (foot-note). 



Lewis, Professor Tayler, preface, xi. 
Liberality — enjoined on the Israelites, 

55- 

Liberty — false views of, 326. Not to 
hinder offices of good will, 332. To 
be regulated by love, 348. Not in- 
tended to justify any use of things 
irrespective of their qualities and ten- 
dencies, 357. 

Liddell and Scott's Lexicon — definition 
of phalagmata, 242; of neepho, 362. 

Liebig, Baron von — on the turbidness of 
vegetable juices before fermentation, 
xx (foot-note). On the arrest of vege- 
table decay by heating up to boiling- 
point, xxvii. On preventing the 
fermentation of wine, xli. The mis- 
chief of introducing imagination into 
scientific researches, xlii. Vital pro- 
cesses not a cause of fermentation, xliii. 
On fermentation, 137. On the waste 
of power by wine, 262. 

Lightfoot, Dr — on the quantity of wine 
used by each person at the passover, 
241. On I Cor. xi. 21, p. 341. 

Liquor traffic — a means of preying on 
society, 118. 

Lytton, Lord (Bulwer)— his ' Last of the 
Barons ' quoted, xxxvi. 

Longevity — a reward of temperance, 
182-3. 

* London Encyclopaedia ' — on Rhenish 
must, xli. 

Longinus — his explanation of Plato's 
'sober deity,' 363. His use of neepho, 

3 6 4- 

Lord's Supper — account of, by St Mat- 
thew, 275-6; by Mark, 290; by St 
Luke, 300; by St Paul, 343. Con- 
nected account of, 283-4. Whether 
instituted in fermented or unfermented 
wine, 277-283. Reasons for its cele- 
bration in non-intoxicating wine at the 
present day, 285-6. Ancient custom 
of using wine and water in, 276. 
Abuses in the Corinthian church's 
celebration of, 338-342. 

Lot — his entertainment of angels, 12. 
His drunkenness, 13. Lessons from 
his history, 13. 

Love — better than wine, 150, 152. 
Should prompt to earnest support of 
the Temperance cause, 321-326, 348. 

Love-feasts — their origin and excesses in 
the primitive church, 338-340. 

Lowth, Bishop — on the use of fresh 
grape-juice by the Egyptians, 18. On 
soraq, 22. 

Lucke — on the crisis of the miracle at 
Cana, 302. 

Lucian — his reference to an excessive 
use of gleukos, 378. 



460 



INDEX. 



Lueneman, Dr — on mustum and wein, 
xxxvii. 

Lyttleton — definition of mustum, ad. 

Lussac, Guy — his explanation of the non- 
fermentation of grape-juice in grapes, 
xxxix. 

M 

I Maccabees vi. 34 — quoted, 181. 
McCaul, Dr — his interpretation of suc- 

cak, xxi ; of bechor and kkag, xxii. 

On kkamushim, xlvi (foot-note). 
MacGregor — on the use of sweet wine, 

Maimonides — his gloss on the Nazarite's 
vow, 41. 

Maltby's Lexicon — definition of neepho, 
362. 

Manahem, the Essene, 254. 

Manasseh ben Israel, Rabbi — on the 
absence of ferment from the passover, 
282. 

Mangey, Dr — his edition of Philo's 
works, 210. 

Manichseans — their opinion of wine, 
xlvi. Referred to by Calvin, 54. Er- 
roneously accused of* inconsistency by 
St Augustine, 308. Differed from 
modern abstainers, 307-8. 

Mann, Dr — on the craving for alcoholic 
liquors, 212 (foot-note). 

Mansel, Professor — quoted, on the su- 
periority of evidence over authority, 
xvii. 

Martial — on Falernian wine, 157. 

Mary the mother of Jesus — her language 
at the marriage of Cana, 301-2. 

Mary Magdalene — confounded with ' the 
woman who was a sinner,' 307. 

Masorites — when they lived and what 
they did, and the distinction made by 
them between shakar and sahkar, 145 
(foot-note). Their correction of ' Sa- 
beans,' 207. 

Meal — three measures of, 269. 

Medhurst, Rev. W. H. — on the meaning 
of yayin, xxxiv (foot-note). 

Melchizedek — his offering of bread and 
wine to Abraham, II. 

Meltzar — his enlightened spirit worthy 
of modern imitation, 213. 

Menander — supposed quotation from, by 
St Paul, 344. 

Mercenary spirit — shown in the liquor 
traffic, 316, 375. 

Methud and methusko — explanation of, 
9, 10, 274, 298, 303, 329, 340, 349, 
355. See also Appendix B, p. 427-8. 

Mephibosheth — his kindness to David, 
86. 

Mesek, 'mixture,' xxx. See Appendix B, 
416-7. 



Metheglin — derivation of the word, 105. 

Meyer — on methuo, 341. 

Michaelis, J. D. — his misquotation of 

Niebuhr as to camel's milk, 68. His 

quotation from Norberg as to the Sa- 

bseans, 256. 

Migne's Cursus Patrologice — named, 
xxxix, 117, 285. 

Milk — teeth white with, 26. Given to 
Sisera, 68. Drunk with wine, 152, 
177. See also Appendix B, under 
khalab, 424. 

Mill, J. S. — on the fluctuating change 
of language, xviii-xix. 

Miller's 'Gardener's Dictionary' — on 
the preservation of new wine, quoted, 
xxxix (foot-note). 

Milton — lines on the intoxicating effect 
of the forbidden fruit, 7. On Eve's 
feast to Raphael, 7. On the drugged 
cup of Comus, 13. On Samson's 
abstinence, 73. On the fatal revelry 
of the Philistines, 75. On the nature 
of true temperance, 317. 

Mishna (the text of the Talmud) — on 
boiled wine, xxvi. Definition of a 
glutton and drunkard, 57. On ashi- 
shah, 85. On the 'tender grape,' 
151. Erroneously referred to, to 
prove the use of fermented wine at 
the passover, 277. Its directions for 
the exclusion of leaven, 279. 

Mithras, feast of — the kings of Persia 
celebrated, by drunkenness, 251. 

Mixed wines — some resembled the bran- 
died wines of the present day, 122. 
The kind prepared by Wisdom, 13 1. 
The cause of many woes, 136, 160. 
Figuratively supplied to Egypt, 164; 
to Jerusalem, 1 76, 247 ; to the heathen, 
188, 200; to Edom, 204; to Moab, 
206-7; to those who occasion drunk- 
enness and love impurity, 241. Said 
to have been presented to criminals 
before execution, 287 (and foot note), 
291. 

Moab — settled on his lees and made 
drunk, 199. 

Mohammed — his only command to cut 
down palm trees, 57. His reference 
to the fruit of the vine, 254, 390. 

Mohammedans — do not regard grapes 
as a forbidden fruit, 390. 

Moderation — definition of, 318. 'In all 
things ' misapplied as an objection to 
total abstinence, 355. 

Montanus — on khamah, xlvii. 

Montgomery, James — his lines on the 
use of unfermented wine before the 
Flood, 8. 

Morality — its teaching on strong drink, 
xlv. 



INDEX. 



461 



Mountains — said to 'drop down wine,' 

228, 232. 
Murphy, Professor — his erroneous view 

of yeqev and tiros/i, xviii, xxx. Canon 

of criticism, 252. 
Myrrh — referred to, 287, 291. 
Myrrhina — both a wine and a sweet, 441. 

N 

Nabal — his churlish answer to David, 
his intemperance, and death, 82-3. 

Nabafhseans — described by Diodorus 
Siculus as abstainers from wine, 1 78-9. 

Nadab and Abihu — the probable cause 
of their sacrilegious act, 37. 

Nazarite — meaning of the name, 41. 
Nature of the vow, 41. Samson con- 
secrated one from his birth, 72. Samuel 
the same, 79. Striking portraiture of 
their physical vigor, 203. Sin of 
tempting them to drink wine, 229-30. 
John the Baptist, a lifelong Nazarite, 
292. St Paul takes a Nazarite vow 
upon him, 316. 

Nazaritism — its rules and essential 
spirit, and distinction between it and 
teetotalism, 44. 

Neepho and Neephalios — critical re- 
marks upon, 361-365. See also Ap- 
pendix B, 428. 

Nehemiah — his sadness before Arta- 
xerxes, 103. His supplies of pro- 
vision, 104. His exhortation to sober 
enjoyment, 105. His protest against 
Sabbath profanation, 107. 

Nero, Emperor — his licentiousness and 
intemperance, 319. His exclamation 
when about to commit suicide, 364. 

Neumann — his technical definition of 
wine, xx. 

Newcome, Archbishop — on khamak, 
xlvii, 240. On tiros h, 217, 237. On 
Hos. iv. 18, p. 220. On Hos. vii. 5, 
p. 221. On Nah. hi. 11, p. 238. On 
Hab. ii. 5, p. 239. 

New wine — how to prevent it from fer- 
menting, xxxix (foot-note), xli. Ex- 
plosive power of, when fermenting, 
xxxix, 116, 266. Why not put into old 
bags, 265. Mr McGregor's account of, 
311. See Appendix B, under ahsis,, 
gleukos, 416, 425. 

New Zealanders — seduced into drunk- 
enness by European influence, 337. 

Niebuhr — on camels' milk, 68. His 
theory as to Belshazzar, 215. On 
the preservation of the fresh grapes in 
Arabia throughout the year, 238. 

Night nurses — ought to abstain from 
alcohol, 386. 

Nineveh — proof of its repentance, 234. 



Defeat of its soldiers through their 

intemperance, 238. 
Noah — drunkenness of, 9. Conjectural 

causes, 10. An ebrius not ebriosus, 

275. Lessons from the narrative, 11. 

Jewish legend concerning the vine he 

planted, II. 
Noah, Judge — on the wine used by the 

Jews of America at the passover, 282. 
Noldius — censured by Dr S. Lee, xviii. 
Norberg, Professor — his translation of 

the ' Book of Adam,' 160. On the 

Sabeans, 256. 
Nordheimer, Professor — on hay-yayin 

hak-khamah, xlvii, 240. 
Notes on the Old Testament, 3-252. 
Notes on the New Testament, 261-389. 



Nymphodorus — his 'Voyage' quoted, 198. 
Objections to total abstinence stated 
and considered : — 

(1) The absence of Church authority, 
xxxiii. 

(2) The identity of the substance desig- 
nated by the same word (wine)xxxiv. 

(3) The use of intoxicating drink by 
good men as equivalent to a Divine 
sanction, xxxvi. 

(4) The absence of entire prohibition 
a partial sanction, xxxvi. 

(5) The interdiction to use 'much 
wine ' an implied sanction of some 
use, xxxvii, 368. 

(6) That unfermented wine does not 
exist, xxxviii. 

(7) That old wine (fermented) is better 
than new, xxxviii. 

(8) That skin-bottles allowed fermen- 
tation to expand without bursting 
them, xxxix. 

(9) That ' wine ' always signifies the 
fermented juice of the grape, xxxix, 

431-433- 

(10) That the juice of the grape always 
contains alcohol, xli. 

(11) That the products of fermentation 
are attributable rather to the prin- 
ciple of life, xliii. 

(12) That Jesus came eating and 
drinking, and not as the Baptist, 
266-268. 

(13) That men are not defiled with 
what goes into the mouth, 270. 

(14) That the Lord used wine at the 
last Supper, 276. 

(15) That Jesus said old wine is better 
than new, 294. 

(16) That the good Samaritan used 
wine and oil for the wounds of the 
man attacked by robbers, 297. 



462 



INDEX. 



(17) That the Lord made wine at 
Cana, 304. 

(18) That the Corinthian Christians 
used intoxicating wine at the Lord's 
Supper, 340. 

(19) That drunkenness is alone forbid- 
den, 354. 

(20) That temperance in all things is 
enjoined, 334. 

(21) That Christian liberty allows the 
use of intoxicating drink, 348. 

(22) That our moderation is to be 
made known to all men, 355. 

(23) That we are not to be judged as 
to meats, 357. 

(24) That every creature of God is 
good, 370. 

(25) That Timothy was commanded 
to take a little wine, 373. 

Odoard Barbosa, quoted 282. 

Offenses, moral — their causes, however 

dear, to be renounced, 263-4. The 

sin of doing what gives them birth, 273. 
Oil — see Appendix B, under shemen, 

elaion, 425, 429. 
Oil-wine, 297. 

Okindunos — epigram concerning, 364. 
Olive tree, Olive yard — see Appendix B, 

under zaith, 425. 
Olshausen — on spiritual and spirituous 

influences, 354. 
Opportunity — always to be embraced in 

doing good, 361. 
Onesimus — his case explained, xxxvi,379- 
Orchard-fruit — see Appendix B, under 

yitzhar, 425. 
Origen — his Hexapla, named, xlix ; 

quoted, 117, 214. 
Osorius, quoted, 282. 
Ox — to be put to death if it had gored 

man or woman, and its owner to be 

responsible if acquainted with its 

dangerous disposition, 30. 



Paidenousa, 'training,' 378. 

Paley, F. A. — why sacrifices to the Eu- 
menides were to be wineless, 363. On 
the wine made by Zeus and the cluster 
which supplied the daily libation to 
Bacchus, 433. 

Palgrave — on the golden droppings of 
dates, xxxi. 

Palmtree, 153. See Appendix B, 425. 

Papias — his report of a legend concerning 
vines, etc., in the millenium, 276. 

Parables — of the vine, 70. Of the 
woman and the leaven, 269. Of the 
householder who planted a vineyard, 
273. Of the good Samaritan, 297. 
Of the vine, 310. 



Paradidomi — various uses of the word, 

343- 

Parkhurst — on khamah, xlvii, 240. 

Parkinson — on wine and its species, 
xl. 

Parsons, Rev. B. — on the derivation of 
'metheglin,' 105. On 'wine on the 
lees,' 168. 

Passover — prohibition of all ferment 
during the period of the feast, 28 (see 
'Ferment'). 

Passover-wine — whether intoxicating or 
not, discussed, 281. Divers customs 
among the modern Jews, 282-3. 

Passover- wine — Mr F. Wright's, xxxviii. 

Patrick, Bishop — on soraq, 22. On 
'liquor of grapes,' 42. On 'adding 
the thirsty with the drunken,' 61. 

Paul, St — his vows, 315-16. His self- 
exercise, 317. His reasoning of tem- 
perance, etc., before Felix, 317-18. 
His appeal for the subjection of the 
animal nature, 320, 330-I, 333-335, 
344-5, 347-8, 358, 378. His explana- 
tion of the Divine origin and object 
of civil government, 320-1. His eu- 
logy of love, 321, 348. His warning 
against revelry, drunkenness, etc., 
321-2, 329, 349, 360; and summons 
to sobriety, 360-1. His exhorta- 
tions against putting a snare or 
stumbling-block in another's way, 
322-5, 331-2-32. His tender con- 
cern for the consciences of others, 
323, 326, 327, 332, 336-7. His ap- 
peal to the example of Christ, 327, 
338; but, after the Spirit, 346. His 
call for the expulsion of the old leaven, 
328. His distinction between things 
'possible' and 'impossible,' 330. His 
condemnation of irregularities at Co- 
rinth in the celebration of the Lord's 
Supper, 338-342. His account of the 
institution of the Supper, 343-4. His 
incitements to Christian usefulness, 
350-1, 355, 380. His contrast be- 
tween fullness of vinous and spiritual 
influence, 352-354. His counsel to 
moderation of mind, 355. His vindi- 
cation of Christian liberty, bounded 
by utility and love, 348, 357. His 
injunction to prove (test) all things, 
365 ; and to abstain from every aspect 
of evil, 366. His counsels to bishops, 
367, 377; to deacons, 368, and their 
wives, 369; to aged men, 377; to aged 
women, young women, and young 
men, 378. Why he did not enjoin 
total abstinence from all kinds of 
wine, 368-9. His advice to Timothy 
to keep himself pure, and permission 
to use a little wine, 370-5. His 



INDEX. 



463 



reference to money as a root of many- 
evils, 375. His language to Philemon 
concerning Onesimus, 379. 

Paxton, J. D. — on the wine-presses at 
Bhadoom, xxx. 

Pcemander — on use of neepho, 356. 

Pentecost, day of— charge against the 
disciples, 31:2-13. Peter's vindication, 

3 J 4- 
Pereira, Dr — on the reason grape-juice 
in grapes does not ferment, xxxix 
(foot-note). 
Persians — their primitive sobriety, 250. 

Subsequent love of wine, 109, 250. 
Persian guards of Darius — their discus- 
sion as to which of all things is 
strongest; the argument as to wine, 
187. 

Peter, St — tradition of his connection 
with the ancient encratites, 253. His 
reply to the mockers on the day of 
Pentecost, 314. His exhortations to 
sobriety, 383-386. His statement of 
the function of government, 384. His 
reference to the example of Christ, 
384-5. His choral association of tem- 
perance with other graces, 388. 

Philistines — destroyed by Samson when 
feasting, 75. 

Phillips, E. — on must as new wine, xli. 

Philo-Judseus — on the abstinence of the 
Jewish priests when officiating, 38, 
210. On the chief butler's dream, 
249. On the exclusion of leaven from 
the passover, 249. On Wisdom's 
sober wine, 255 (foot-note). On the 
Essenes, 255-6. On the Therapeutse, 
257. On gluttonous indulgence in 
wine, 303, 349-50. On inspiration 
being mistaken for intoxication, 31 1. 
On the wise man's avoidance of wine 
and every drug of folly, 354. His 
use of neepho and neephalios, 364. 

Photius — on the Severian's aversion to 
wine, 253. 

Physiology — its testimony concerning 
strong drink, xlv. 

Pick, Professor — on khamah, xlvii. 

Pierotti, Signor — on the modern Re- 
chabites, 196. 

' Piers Plowman ' — quoted, xxxvii (foot- 
note). 

Pierson, Dr — on the cause of Dr Hol- 
yoke's death, 183. 

Piscator — on be-dahmkah, 206. 

Plato — his approval of abstinence from 
wine on important occasions, 251. 
His testimony on intemperance at 
Athens, 352. His use of neepho, 363. 
His view of putting drinking-parties 
under the control of sober men, 364 
(foot-note). 



Pliny the naturalist — His technical defi- 
nition of wine, xx. On sapa, defrutwn, 
syneum, xxvii. On the meaning of 
inebriare, 9. On the use of paint by 
the Roman ladies, 23. On the salu- 
brity of vinegar, 77. On the sweet 
scent of the flowering vine, 105. On 
the great varieties of ancient wines, 
152, 374. On 'the strength' {vires') 
of wine being broken by the filter, 168, 
278. On the thickness of the famous 
Opimian wine, 295. On oil-wine {oleum 
gleucinium), 297. On the evils and 
insatiable consumption of wine, 347 
On medicinal wines, 374. Recipes, 
435-440- 

Plumptrc, Professor — his account of the 
Rechabites, 195. 

Plutarch — on the use of wine by the 
kings and priests of Egypt, 19. On 
the Egyptian tradition concerning the 
origin of wine, 20. On the tradition 
concerning the bull Apis, 26. On the 
prohibition laid on the priests of Jupiter 
not to touch leaven, 29. On wine 
whose strength was broken by filter- 
ing to increase its consumption, 278. 
On methuer, 341 (foot-note). On 
Epaminondas, 361. His use of neepho, 
363. Proverb concerning the tippler 
and abstainer, 364 (foot-note). 

Poison — wine so called. First by Moses, 
13, 63. By Jerome, 38, 62. By au- 
thorized version, 247. 

Polyglott, Bishop Walton's — quoted, 15, 
47, 106. 

Pollian wine, 374. 

Pollux — his definition of neephaluein, 
362. 

Pomegranate — described, 81. Juice of, 

154- 
Pope, A. — his note on Hector's refusal 

to drink wine, 73. 
Popular Cyclopcedia (The) — on must and 

wine, xli. 
Porphyry — his use of neepho, 365. 
Porter, Professor J. D. — on the mean- 
ing of baith, ' house,' xxxv. 
Posca (sour wine) — the common drink 

of the Roman soldiers, xxviii, 77, 361. 
Pottage — 244. 
Poverty — the result of indulgence in 

drink, 134. 
Preface to the Notes, xlix — 1. 
Preliminary Dissertation, xvii — xlviii. 
Preserves — see Appendix B, under she- 

mahrim, 417. 
Prevalent use of intoxicating drinks — no 

valid argument in their favor, 3. 
Prideaux, Dean — on the Essenes, 256. 
Priests — forbidden to use wine and strong 

drink when officiating, 36-38, 209. 



464 



INDEX. 



Corrupted by wine and strong drink, 

170. 
Princes — not to desire strong drink, 142. 
Prize of ^50 — for proof that alcohol 

exists in grapes, xlii. 
Proclus — his reference to wine expressed 

from grape-clusters, 433. 
Proof-tests — to be applied to all things, 

365- 

Prophets — corrupted by wine and strong 
drink, 170. Acceptable when pro- 
phesying falsely of wine and strong 
drink, 235. 

Propositions — laid down in this work, 
xvii, xxxi. 

Proudhon (not Proudhomme) — ironically 
accused of being a water-drinker, 312. 

Prudence — a reason for total abstinence, 
320. 

Pruning-hooks — see Appendix B, under 
mazmaroth, 420. 

Psammetichus — said to have been the 
first king of Egypt who drank wine, 19. 

Purah (or Poorah) — xxx. See Appen- 
dix B, 421. 

Purey-Cust, A. — on the ignoring of con- 
science, 356. 

Purim, feast of — intemperance at, men- 
tioned by the Talmud, 1 12. Still cele- 
brated by drinking in the East, 1 12. 

Purity — endangered by the use of intoxi- 
cating drinks, 331, 347, 371. 

Purpose of a speaker — always to be con- 
sidered in the interpretation of his 
language, xxiii. 

Q 

Quarterly Review (The) — on the thick- 
ness of ancient wines, and the necessity 
of diluting them, 279. 

R 

Rabba and Rabbi Zira — Rabbinical story 
of, 112. 

Rabshakeh — his name and speeches to 
the Jews, 92-3. 

Raisin-wine — extensively used at the 
Lord's Supper, 284. Used by Jews 
at the passover, 282-3. Recipe for 
making it, 286. Excessively used by 
Roman ladies, 138, 369. 

Raisin-cake, 85, 96. See Appendix B, 
under askiskah, 417. 

Raisins — clusters of, 82, 96. See Ap- 
pendix B, under tzi?nmuqim, 417. 

Ramsay, Dean — on the alluring nature 
of wine, 262 (foot-note). 

Rawlinson, Professor — on primitive Per- 
sian manners and their degeneracy, 250. 

Rawlinson, Sir H. — on Belshazzar as 
king of Babylon, 215. 



Rechab— the name and historical asso- 
ciations explained, 191-2. 

Rechabites — their descent, residence in 
Judea, trial, fidelity, reward, 191-195. 
Notices of them by Benjamin of 
Tudela, Dr Wolff, and Signor Pierotti, 
195-6. Lessons from the narrative of 
their history and constancy, 196-7. 

Record (The)— on the want of Bible 
warrant for slavery, xxxv-vi. 

Redding, Cyrus — his book on wines, 
quoted, 31. 

Redness (or darkness) of eyes — descrip- 
tive of a blessing, 22-24. Indicative 
of wine-bibbing, 136. 

Redness of grape-juice — peculiar to some 
species of grapes, 180-1 (foot-note). 

Reed — used at the crucifixion, 288. 

Reeling — as from drunkenness, 167. See 
Appendix B, 423. 

Richardson, Dr B. W. — on alcohol, 
471. 

Reid, Dr T. — on the appetite for stimu- 
lants, 261 (foot-note). The appetite 
for intoxicating liquors unnatural, 381. 

Renan, Professor — his version of Job 
xxiv. 11 and xxiv 18, p. 115 (foot-note). 

Repentance — evidenced by acts, 156. 

Revenue — ought not to be derived from 
the sale of alcohol, 389. 

Revue d' ' Econo??iie Chretienne — on the 
effects of the French vintage, 236. 

Rheims — Roman Catholic English Ver- 
sion of the New Testament (a. d. 1582), 
quoted 292, 317, 322, 333, 353, 355. 

Ritchie, Rev. W. — on * wine on the 
lees,' 168. 

Roberts — on the Oriental love of gar- 
dens, 96. 

Robertson, W. — on vinum, etc., xl. 

Robinson's New Testament Lexicon 
( Dr E. ) — on myrrh, 29 1 . On kraipalee, 
299. His allocation of Cana, 301. 

Robinson ( Pilgrim Father ) — on the 
breaking forth of new truth out of the 
Bible, xxxiii. 

Robinson, Robert, of Cambridge — his 
notes on Claude quoted, xxxvi (foot- 
note). 

Robson, Rev. Smylie — his testimony to 
the dietetic use and value of grapes 
in Syria, xxviii-ix, 93 (foot-note). 

Roman soldiers — their use of posca, JJ, 
361. 

Roman women — their abstinent habits in 
early times and subsequent degeneracy, 

369- 
Rosenmiiller — his reason ascribed for 
the abstinence of Egyptian kings, 19. 
On the 'tear of trees,' 31. On Che- 
mosh, 49. On Michaelis's misquota- 
tion of Niebuhr, 68. 



INDEX. 



465 



Rubies — Nazarites compared to (doubt 
as to the translation), 303. 

Rule, Rev. Dr — on the use of grape- 
juice in ancient times, 378. On oinos, 
442. 

Rumalia — an ancient Roman goddess to 
whom wineless sacrifices were offered, 

S 

Sabseans — said to have been disciples of 
John, 256. 

Sabeans — whether named in Ezek. xxiii. 
42, p. 207. 

Sacred history — one of development, 
252. 

Sacrifices — which are most acceptable to 
God, 380. 

Sale — his comment on the Koran, 390. 

Samaria — intemperance of, 169, 230. 
Woman of, 309. 

Samaritan text and version — named, 
xlix ; quoted, 10, II, 21, 27, 37, 47, 53. 

Samson, ' sunlike ' — his mother forbid- 
den to use wine or strong drink, 71-2. 
His consecration as a lifelong Nazarite, 
72. His faults no argument against 
abstinence, 74. His appeal for water, 
74. His last exploit and death, 75. 

Samuel — dedicated as a lifelong Nazarite, 

79- 
Sapa (grape-juice boiled down to one- 
half its bulk), xxvii. Classed with 

wines by Dioscorides, xl. 
Saracens — subdued the East and Spain 

without the use of strong drink, 95. 
Saturday Review (The) — quoted and 

answered, xxxviii. 
Schedius — definition of neepho, 362. 
Schleusner — his derivation and definition 

of neepho, 362. 
Schrevelius — his definition of neepho, 362. 
Scott, Sir W. — his use of the word '■ fou,' 

for both 'full' and 'drunken,' 341-2. 
Science and Scripture — are in harmony, 

xxi, xxxiii, xlviii. Testimony on 

strong drink, xlvi. 
Scripture — teaching on wine, xliv. (See 

Bible). 
Seacchus — on Isa. xxv. 6, p. 168. 
Self-confidence — of tipplers, 172. Should 

be exchanged for watchfulness and 

abstinence, 335. 
Self-denial — a Christian duty related to 

the practice of total abstinence, 272, 

295, 326, 327, 334. 
Self-indulgence — is self-punishment, 134, 

188. 
Selwyn, Bishop — his testimony to the 

influence of Europeans on the drunk- 
enness of Maories of New Zealand, 

337 (foot-note). 

59 



Sensualists — their motto, 164, 298, 344. 

Septuagint Greek Version of the Old 
Testament — its origin, xlix. Quoted, 
3, 9, 10, 11, 12, 15, 16, 21—23, 27— 
33, 36, 41-2, 45-47, 49, 51-53, 55-57, 
59-68, 70-72, 77, 79-86, 88-9, 91-93, 
96-138, 140-144, 146-154, 156, 158- 
160, 162-167, 169, 171, 163-179, 181- 
185, 187-189, 191, 198-200, 202-204, 
206-209, 211-12, 214, 217-219, 221, 
2 33> 235-6, 238-9, 240, 242-248, 340. 

Serpents — the action of wine compared 
to the bite of a serpent, xlvi, 137. 
Supposed to be fond of wine, which 
increased the virulence of their poison, 
62. The brazen serpent broken to 
pieces, 92. 

Shakar (Greek sikera) 'sweet drink,' — 
see Appendix B, 418. 

Shakspeare — on 'the invisible spirit of 
wine,' xliv. 

Shahkar — see Appendix B, 422. 

Sibylline oracles — on a period of abun- 
dant food and joy, 232. 

Shaw, Dr T. — the meaning of debash, 20. 

Shicron — name of a Jewish town, 67. 

Sin — incurred by a neglect to do known 
good, 382. 

Slavery — defended, as drinking-customs 
are, by an appeal to Scripture, 379. 

Smith, Dr E. — on alcohol in any quantity 
as a disturber and weakener, xliv, 262 
(foot-note). 

Smith, Rev. Dr Pye — on the vine after 
the Deluge, 10. 

Smith's, Dr W., 'Dictionary of the 
Bible ' — error as to tirosh, xviii. 

Smith's, Dr W., Latin and English Dic- 
tionary — quoted, on ebrius, etc., 9. 

Snares — to be avoided, 263. Not to be 
set before others, 273. 

Sober-minded — for its Scripture use, see 
Appendix B, under sophron, 428. 

Sodom — wine of, 13. Vine of, 62 (foot- 
note). 

Solima — stone wine-presses at, xxx. 

Sophocles — his use of neepho, 363. 

Soraq — see Appendix B, 419. 

Sowing and reaping — their inseparable 
connection, 350-1. 

Speechley — his work on the vine quoted, 
180-1. 

Spirit — Webster gives twenty-one defini- 
tions of, xxiii (foot-note). 

Sponge — dipped in vinegar, 288. 

Stanley, Dean — on methui, xxii (foot- 
note). On a new leaf of the Bible to 
be turned, xxxiii. On methud, 341. On 
the words, ' as often as ye drink it, ' 343 
(also foot-note). Erroneously attributes 
to Mohammedans an aversion to the 
vine, 390. 



466 



INDEX. 



Stephanus — his definition of neepka/ios, 
362. 

Stephens — his received Greek Text, A. D. 
1550, xlvi. 

Steudel, Dr — on submission to Scripture, 
xxii. 

Stowell, Canon — on man causing an ap- 
parent discord between science and 
Scripture, xix. 

Straying — like a drunken man, 114, 164. 

Strong drink — forbidden to the priests 
when officiating, 36. Forbidden to the 
Nazarites, 41. When permitted, 53. 
Forbidden to Samson's mother, 71. 
Said to be 'raging,' 133. Not to be 
desired by princes, 143. Only suited 
to the hopeless, 144. Becoming bitter 
to the taste, 165. Ruinous to priests 
and prophets, 170. Enervating effect 
of, 181. Forbidden to John the Bap- 
tist, 292. 

Stuart, Professor — on Joseph's brethren 
making merry with him, 21. On the 
Nazarites not being permitted to use 
vine-fruit, 44. On the wine used at 
the passover, 283. 

Stum — abbreviation of mustum, xl. 

Stumblingblocks — to be removed, 263-4, 
322. 

Subject — nature of, part of the context, 
xxiv. 

Syr and syrceum — referred to, xxvii. 

Suetonius — his account of Tiberius Csesar, 
293 ; of Claudius Ceesar, 315 ; of Nero, 
310. 

Suidas — on g/eukos, xl, 313. His 
definition of neephalioi thusai, 362. 

Surfeiting — reproved, 299. 

Surenne — definition of 'sou/, full, drunken, 
427. 

Swinburne — on the preservation of fresh 
grapes in Spain, 278. 

Sycophant — derivation and use of the 
word, 229. 

Syrup — derivation of, xxvi. 

Symmachus's Greek Version of the Old 
Testament — when prepared, xlix. 
Quoted, 3, 23, 42, 62, 83, 84, 1 16-17, 
1 19-124, 131-2, 134, 151-2, 154, 156, 
158-9, 166-7, 169-171, 176, 181, 185, 
203, 208. 

Syriac Version of the Old Testament — 
quoted 42, 52-3, 57, 65, 70, 77, 85, 
108, 113-115, 1 18-9, 124, 126, 129, 

13°. I33» *35-i& H3-4, i55> l6o > 
163, 165, 167, 169, 1 70-1, 202-3, 208, 
217-18, 221-2, 231, 238, 240, 246. 



Table of Contents, v. 
Tacitus — on the drinking customs of the 
ancient Germans, 10. 



' Take away the heart ' — how to be under- 
stood, 219-20. 

Talmud, composed of the Mishna (the 
text) and two Gemaras (commen- 
taries) — sanction of drunkenness at 
the feast of Purim, 112. On the 
'blessings ' for fruit, etc., 218. Refer- 
ences to the use of wine at the pass- 
over, 229, 284. Traditions respect- 
ing the supply of drugged wine to 
criminals, 287, 291. 

Targums, expositions of the Old Testa- 
ment — their authors and character 
described, xlix. Quoted, 3, 9, 10, 
11, 13, 15, 21-2, 25, 36, 41-2, 46-49, 
a-53, 60-62, 64-5, 70-1, 77, 79, 80, 
82, 85-86, 108-9, II0 > 1 15-16, 118, 
120-122, 124, 126-7, i3°> J 33> H3-4, 
147-149, 151, 156, 159, 160, 163, 165, 
169, 1 70-1, 176, 198, 203, 206, 208, 
217-220, 222-3, 22 5-6, 228, 230-1, 
236-240, 246-7, 251. 

Tatham, Archdeacon — his objections to 
unfermented wine at the Lord's Sup- 
per, 277. 

Tatian — his abhorrence of wine, 253. 

Tavernier, Baron — on the wine used at 
the Lord's Supper by the Christians 
of St John, 282. 

Temperance — true meaning of, 149. 
Justly used to designate the total 
abstinence movement, 292, 317-18. 
Should form a subject of preaching, 
318. A fruit of the Spirit, 350. Its 
comprehensiveness, 377. - 

Temperance reform — a harbinger of the 
gospel, 292. 

Temperate — for use of, in N. T., see 
Appendix B, under enkratees and 
sophron, 428. 

' Temperate in all things ' — the abuse of 
this phrase corrected, 334. 

Temptation — in the garden of Eden, no 
justification of the use or sale of in- 
toxicating drinks, 3. Lessons to be 
drawn from the trial in Eden, 4. Of 
God, by man, 26. How associated 
with the use of alcoholic liquors, 261-2, 
264. Not chargeable upon God, 380. 

Theocritus — his allusion to vinegar used 
by reapers, 77. 

Theodore, Emperor of Abyssinia — the 
evil effects of his intemperance, 270. 

Theodoret — on Tatian's abhorrence of 
wine, 253. 

Theodotion's Greek Version of the Old 
Testament — when composed, xlix. 
Quoted, 1, 62, 117, 131, 133, 135, 136, 
143, 158, 169, 171, 178, 181. 

Theognis — his use of neepho, 364. 

Thevenot — on the buckets used in the 
East, 309. 



INDEX. 



467 



Therapeutse ('healers') — their profes- 
sion, 256. Philo's testimony to their 
purity and abstinence, 257. 

Thomson, J. — lines from his ' Seasons,' 
on palm- wine, 18 (foot-note). 

Thumos, heat, fury, 391. 

Times (The) — on paradise, 6. On the 
destruction of corn in the manufacture 
of ardent spirits, 132. On armor-plate 
rolling without strong drink, 1 75. 

Timothy — to keep himself pure, 371. 
Might use a little wine, 371-374. 

Tirosh — not a fluid, but the solid fruit 
of the vine, 15, 51, 53, 70, 117, 129, 
179, 185, 217-220, 223, 226, 236, 244. 
See also ' Vine-fruit ' and Appendix B, 
414. Variously translated. By Wal- 
ton, mustum, 47, 53, etc. By Arabic, 
etzer, 'juice,' 47, 52, 104, etc. By St 
Jerome, vindemice, 52, 106. By Aquila, 
fruit, 52, 165. By Gesenius, grape, 
vine-fruit, 165-7. 

Tirosh-lo-Yayin ('Tirosh not Yayin') 
—quoted, on the size of grapes in Syria 
and England, 46. On soveh, 157. On 
the color of grape-juice, 180- 1 (foot- 
note). On oil-wine, 197. 

Tokay wine — how produced, 31. 

Tongue — in what sense full of deadly 
poison, 380. 

Total abstinence — see ' Abstinence ' and 
' Temperance. ' 

'Touch not, taste not, handle not,' 358. 

Trench, Archbishop — on the drawing of 
the water by the servants at Cana, 
and the character of the miracle 
wrought, 303. 

Trees — bearing fruit not to be cut down, 
56. 

Truth — stronger than wine, 187. Sym- 
bolized by 'living water,' 394. 

Tyndale's English Version of the New 
Testament (a. d. 1527) — quoted, 267, 
275> 2 95, 303. 317, 328', 333, 355, 366, 
367, 372. 

U 

Unfermented things — alone permitted at 
the passover, and why, 27. See Ap- 
pendix B, under matzah and azumee. 

Unfermented wine — can it be preserved ? 
xxxviii. Mr F. Wright's, xxxviii, 86. 
Made near Cincinnati, xxxviii. How to 
preserve it, xxxviii, xli. Improved 
by age, why, xxxix, 294. Whether 
used at the institution of the Lord's 
Supper, 277-283. Used by Eastern 
churches, 282. Reasons for its use by 
modern churches, 285-6. Recipe for 
its domestic manufacture, 286. Words 
for, or applied to [see Tirosh\ Dios- 
corides, xl. Gleukos, used by 



Josephus, 18. Suidas, 312-313. Sweet- 
cider, 314. Khamrah =*= Yayin ; le- 
gend from Talmud, 15, 25. Tar- 
gum on Canticles, 151. Boiled wine, 
208. Oinos used by Anacreon, 22 ; 
Philo, 249 ; Papias, 276. Persian 
sherap and pekmez, ' wine ' ; Turkish, 
boiled wine or syrup, 443. Arabic 
nebeedh, unintoxicating wine, 445. 
Yayin and oinos, 22, 60, and Appendix 
C, 431. Viniim, used by Aquinas, 
xxxix, 285 ; by Dindorf, 202 ; by an- 
cient and modern authors, xxxix, Mont- 
gomery, 8. Thomson, 18. Macgregor, 
312. See 445. 
Ure, Dr A. — on grape-juice before fer- 
mentation, as sweet wine, xli. On 
the prevention of fermentation by re- 
moval of yeast, 168. 



Valpy, F. E. J. — on mustum and merum, 
xli. His derivation of neepho, 362. 

Vashti — her banquet, 1 10. 

Vine — planted by Noah, legend of, 9. 
Cultivated in Egypt, 17, 123-4. Fable 
of Jotham, 70. Sitting under, a sign 
of security, 88, 245. Species growing 
wild, 91, 248. Planted on hill-sides, 
188, 225. Price of, in the time of 
Isaiah, 161. Of Sibmah, 161, 199. 
Languishing, 165. Dried up, 226. 
Its wood only fit for fuel, 206. On 
the phrase 'a vine in thy blood,' 206. 
' Fruit of,' 290. A type of Christ, 310. 
See also Appendix B, under gephen and 
ampelos. 

Vine-dressers, 75, 99, 179, 201, 226. 

Vine-fruit — value of, in the East, xxviii, 
93. See Appendix B, under 'Tirosh,'4i4. 

Vinegar — forbidden to the Nazarites, 
41. Given to Ruth, 77. Prophetic 
allusion to, 121. Proverbs concern- 
ing, 132, 138. Offered to Christ, 
mingled with gall, and refused, 287. 
Offered to Him on the cross, and 
received, 287-8, 291, 300, 311. 

Vineyards — Mosaic rules concerning, 39, 
40. Their narrow paths, 49. Not to 
be sown with diverse seeds, 58. 
Might be plucked by the passer by, 
59. Not to be gleaned by the owner, 
59. Naboth's, desired by Ahab, 90. 
Of the wicked, 114. Avoided by the 
wicked, 115. In flower, 151, 153-4. 
Solomon's, 155. Measured by yokes, 
159. Of 'red wine,' 168. Devastated, 
230-1. Parable of, 273, 290. St Paul's 
reference to, 332. 

Vinet — on the possibility of great errors 
in the Church, xxxiii. 



468 



INDEX. 



Vintage — of Abi-ezer, a proverb for 
scarcity, 69. Celebrated by the She- 
chemites with songs, 71. Failure of, 
described, 159, 173, 199, 223, 241. 
Shouting to cease, 162. Prolific, 245. 

Virgil — on the site of vines, 158. On 
sweet must, 441. 

Vow — of the Nazarites, 41. Assumed 
by St Paul, 315-6. 

Vulgate (The) Latin Translation of the 
Old and New Testament — when and 
by whom executed, xlix. Quoted, 3, 
9, 12, 13, 15, 16, 21-2, 27-29, 31-33, 
36, 41-2, 44, 47, 49, 52-3, 55-57, 59- 
68, 70-72, 77, 79-86, 88-9, 91-93, 96- 

138, 141-144, H7-i5 6 > 158-171, 173- 
179, 181-183, 185-189, 191, 198-200, 
202-209, 211-12, 214, 217-232, 235- 
240, 242-248, 265, 274, 295, 333, 353, 
355, 367. 



W 

Wages — wasted in intoxicating drinks, 

243- 

Watchfulness — connected with sobriety, 
360-1. 'To prayers,' 385. 

Water — highly valued in the East, 14, 
88, 127, 174-5. Israelites murmured 
for, 29. Song of the tribes, 48. Offer 
of payment for, by the Israelites, 81. 
King Saul's cruse of, 83. Supplied to 
Elijah, 88, Not given to the weary, 
114. An emblem of conjugal affec- 
tion, 130. Given to the thirsty, 140, 
164. Proverb concerning, 141. The 
'stay of water,' 157. A refreshment 
to the smith, 175, 205. A cup, if 
given to a disciple, to be rewarded, 
266. Living water, 309. A type of 
Christ, 335. Represented by Plato as 
the neephon theos, 'abstemious deity,' 
363. The water of life, 394. 

Water-pots — at the marriage feast in 
Cana, 302. 

Water-drinker — meaning of the term, 

37i, 373- 
Webster's (Dr) Dictionary — definition 

of must as wine, xli. 
Webster and Wilkinson's ' Notes on the 

New Testament' — on the phrase 'one 

is hungry and another is drunken,' 339. 

On the words ' appearance of evil,' 366. 
Weisinger — his view that bishops only 

are restricted to monogamy, xxxvii. 
Wells used by Abraham's herdsmen, 14. 

Song of the well, 48. Bethlehem's, 87. 

Jacob's, 309. 
Wesley, Rev. John — on the Nazarites, 

37. On fortunes made in the liquor 

traffic, 375-6. On raising a revenue 

from the sale of the ' poison ' — ardent 



spirits, 389. On Societies for reforma- 
tion of manners, 380. 

Westminster Assembly of Divines — their 
Annotations quoted, 209, 219, 235. 

Wetstein — referred to, 378, 389. 

' Whatsoever things are true,' etc.— the 
great principle of Christian life and 
duty, 355-6. 

Whitby, Dr — on ' temperate in all things,' 

333- 

Wiclifs English Version of the New 
Testament (a. d. 1380) — quoted, 267, 
292, 295, 301, 303, 317, 328, 372. 

Wilkinson, Sir G.— on the culture of the 
vine in Egypt, 17. On the opposite 
properties of ancient wines, 18. On 
vineyard- wine and palm-wine, 18. On 
the use of wine by the kings of Egypt, 
19. 

Williams, Rev. Dr E. — errors of inter- 
pretation for want of closer search, 
xxxiv. 

Wine — its primary relation to the vine- 
cluster, xx. The name properly applied 
to the juice of grapes before fermenta- 
tion, xxxix, 9; see also Appendix C. 
Preserved in its grapes from the crea- 
tion, 15, 251. Made from unpressed 
grapes, 31. Forbidden to the priests 
when officiating, 36, 209-211. Va- 
rieties of, 105. Bursting bags for 
want of vent, 105, 265-6. Wine ' of 
astonishment,' 120. Mixed and foam- 
ing, 122. Making glad the heart, 125. 
Wine 'of violence,' 130. Prepared 
by Wisdom, 131. Described as 'a 
mocker,' 133. The lover of, not to be 
rich, 134. When not to be looked 
upon (desired), 136-138. Not to be 
drunk by kings, 143. Only adapted 
to produce oblivion, 144. Followed 
after by the Preacher, 147. To be 
drunk with a merry heart, 148. 
Causing mirth, 149. Spiced, 154. 
Mixed with water, 156. Inflaming 
effect of, 159. Ceasing to abound, 166. 
Ruinous to priest and prophet, 1 70-1 72. 
Argument on its title to be accounted 
the strongest of all things, 187. Asked 
for by children, 202. Of Helbon, 
208-9. Refused by Daniel and his 
friends, 211. At Belshazzar's feast, 
214. Said 'to take away the heart,' 
219. Defiling the king and princes 
of Samaria, 222. Of Lebanon, 224. 
Failure of, 225. Often condemned, 
229. Given to the Nazarites, 230. 
Drunk in bowls, 231. A defrauder, 
239. Inflaming drink, 240. Old 
preferred to new, 294. Of Arcadia, 
295. Opimian, 295. Miraculously 
produced at Cana, the kind and quan- 



INDEX. 



469 



tity considered, 304-307. Mingled 
with gall and myrrh, 287, 291. St 
Paul's declaration concerning, 324. 
Contrasted with the influence of the 
Holy Spirit, 354-5. Its nutritious 
value 156 times less than that of beef- 
steak, 370.- A little allowed to Timo- 
thy, 371. Use of, by bishops, dea- 
cons, etc., 367, 377. Of God's wrath, 
391-2; and of fornication, 391-393. 
See also Appendix B, under yayin, 
ahsis, soveh, khamar, tirosh, shemah- 
rim, ashishah, khatnah, oinos, gleukos ; 
and Appendix C. 

Winebibbers — condemned, 135. 

Wine countries — their supposed sobriety 
not real, 171, 235-6. 

Wine-press — the nature of, and references 
to those used at Bhadoom and Solima, 
xxx. Of Zeeb, 69. Abounding with 
tirosh, 129, 227-8. Trodden by the 
Messiah, 180. Trodden by Jehovah, 
202. Trodden by foreign nations, 228. 
Small produce of, 244. Of God's 
wrath, 391, 393. See also Appendix 
B, under yeqeb, gath, purah, 421. 

Wine-vat (or wine-fat) — nature of, 290. 

Wisdom — her invitation to drink of her 
mixed wine, 131. Justified by her 
children, 295. 

Wolff, Rev. Dr — his interviews with 
modern Rechabites, 196. 

Women — intemperance of, peculiarly de- 
grading, 80. Among the ancient Ro- 
mans prohibited from using wine, 369. 
In Austria very sober, 369. 

Wordsworth, Dr — on St Paul's advice to 
Timothy, 373. 

Work — the hardest performed without 
intoxicating drink, 175. 



Wormwood wine — its nature, 203. See 
1 Absinthe.' 

Worms — destructive to vines, 60. 

Wounds — associated with wine, 297. 

Wright, F. — his unfermented sacramental 
wine favorably noticed by Dr Hassall, 
xxxviii (foot-note). Improves with age, 
xxxix. Proved by experiments to con- 
tain no alcohol, xlii. 

Words — examples of their various appli- 
cations, xix, xxxv. 

Wylie, Rev. J. A. — on the wines of 
Lebanon, 224. 



Xenophon — his account of the fall of 
Babylon, 215. His definition of 'the 
temperate man ' (enkratees), 317. His 
account of the ancient eranoi, 338. 
On the address of Cyrus to his chiefs, 
361. 

Y 

Yayin, * grape-juice ' — its generic sense, 
xx. Its derivation, xxv. Different 
senses, xxvi-vii. See also Appendices 
B, C, and D. 

Yitzhar, 'orchard-fruit' — derivation of 
the name, xxix. See Appendix B. 
Not oil. Translated 'fruit' by Sep- 
tuagint, 189. Orchard-fruit, associated 
with corn and vintage-produce, see 
Tirosh. 

Yonge, F. — his definition oineephon, 362. 

Yeqev, ' press ' — derivation and mean- 
ing of, xxx, 421. 



Zabian ' Book of Adam ' — noticed, 160. 
Zythus (barley- wine or beer), 18. 



In closing this volume of Sacred Exposition, we would direct the mind of the 
sincere Student and Truth-Seeker to the marvelous manner in which modern 
science at last is compelled to lay offerings upon the shrine of Divine Truth. Dr 
W. B. Richardson, F. R. S., of London, writing in the Medical Times, thus 
concludes his elaborate inquiries into the action of alcohol : 

" Speaking honestly, I cannot by the arguments yet presented to me admit the 
alcohols through any gate that might distinguish them as apart from other chemical 
bodies. I can no more accept them as foods than I can chloroform, or ether, or 
methylal. That they produce a temporary excitement is true, but as their general 
action is quickly to reduce animal heat, I cannot see how they can supply animal 
force. I see clearly how they reduce animal power, and can show a reason for 
using them in order to stop physical pain or to stupefy mental pain ; but that they 
give strength — i. e. that they supply material for construction of vital tissue, or 
throw force into tissues supplied by other material — must be an error as solemn as 
it is wide-spread. The true character of the alcohols is, that they are agreeable 
temporary shrouds. The savage, with the mansions of his soul unfurnished, buries 
his restless energy under their shadow. The civilized man, overburdened with 
mental labor or with engrossing care, seeks the same shade ; but it is a shade after 
all, in which, in exact proportion as he seeks it, the seeker retires from perfect 
natural life. To resort for force to alcohol, is, to my mind, equivalent to the act 
of searching for the sun in subterranean gloom, until all is night." 

What a striking comment that, upon the oldest wisdom — 'Wine IS A mocker.' 



WILL YOU HELP SPREAD THE TRUTH? 



Do you ask, dear reader, what truth? Well, suffer me to 
explain. Our country, and all its great interests of health, 
industry, intelligence, and morals, is cursed by intemperance ; and 
the work of the Christian church marred and hindered by its 
defilement. The great principles of the Temperance movement 
are, by infidel, sensual, and interested men, opposed with the alle- 
gation, that the Bible sanctions the use of inebriating liquors, 
and therefore that drinking is right ! This doctrine has been 
the bane of the church, and has occasioned the downfall of 
myriads within its pale, and is still, leading millions more to the 
same impending doom. I am now an old man in my 78th year, 
and for over thirty years have had this matter on my mind. 
From the beginning I rejected the notion that any word of God, 
truly interpreted, contradicted the verdict of Experience and 
Science as to the noxious character of strong drink. In my 
Enquirer, and other periodicals (from 1835 to '43), I held that the 
' cup of blessing ' and ' wine the mocker ' must refer to things 
essentially different in quality. In this position I was sustained 
by many eminent scholars and writers — such as Stuart, Bush, 
Bishop A. Potter, Nott, Goodell, Duffield, Chapin, among the 
clergy, and Chancellor Walworth, Prof. C. A. Lee, E. James and 
L. M. Sargent, among the laity. 

In an initial endeavor to explore and explain so elaborate and 
profound a problem, it was inevitable that some lapses and errors 
should occur, but after all the criticism, the main position is left 
untouched and impregnable. English writers, especially three, 
have pursued the inquiry to the end, and two of them have con- 
centrated the established results of all previous research, and of 
their own study, into one great volume, which it seems to me, as 
to many others better able to judge of the mere learning, 
demonstrates the harmony of scripture truth with temperance 
teaching, lifts the whole question out of the region of mystery, 
and vindicates the Bible from the aspersions of the sensualist and 
sceptic. 

THE TEMPERANCE BIBLE COMMENTARY 

is the book I refer to. The English edition, obtainable here only 
for three dollars, is now handsomely reprinted, with valuable addi- 
tions, and can be had 

FOR TWO AND A HALF DOLLARS, 

payable on delivery. In referring you to the opinions of learned 
men and the press as to the character of the work, I solicit you tc 
subscribe and read, and to induce your friends to do likewise, so 
God's truth may be promoted, and suffering men may be saved. 

Edward C. Delavan. 
Schenectady, N. Y., Feb. 14, 1870. 



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